An Unlikely Friendship
by PeteyDG
Summary: YES AN ACTUAL NEW CHAPTER, 14! Inspired by and a continuation of Nix's Charity, posted here as Chapter One, pre-Clerks, non-slash, A/U take on how Jay & Silent Bob met and became the inseparable duo we know and love. Rated R for language, violence.
1. One

**__**

Disclaimers: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters. This chapter was written by web author Nix and originally posted on FanFiction.net under the title Charity. It is the inspiration and foundation for the rest of this story and is used here with the utmost respect and thanks.

ONE

I never really planned on this whole intimidation racket to begin with. I mean, I was raised with the whole fucking "turn the other cheek" philosophy recited at me every other week, which is not exactly conducive to wanting to make with the head injuries. It was kind of . . . self-preservation.

Sounds funny, considering what I look like now. I will admit that I'm a scary looking bastard. But I wasn't always. And in a town where everybody is balls deep in everyone else's shit two seconds after it happens, if you're a nerdy looking kid who'd rather hang out in a Radio Shack or – God fucking forbid – a bookstore instead of tossing a football back and forth or running around the track like a little bitch, you have to either get very big or learn to get punched in the face.

I was never real good at getting punched in the face. So I went with the other option.

Leaning against a light pole, I rummage in my pocket for a lighter and a cigarette. A few quick motions and the smoke is rolling on my tongue, a fucking lot warmer than the weather out here. It's too cold to even snow, which might add some shred of value to the fact that it's been gray outside for the last month and a half. Grayer than usual for Jersey, anyway. I stopped going outside in the day because it was getting too depressing.

Then again, depressing might be an improvement over so fucking crowded you have to swim through all the nice people. People shoving each other, dragging children around so they can get their precious shopping done as fast as they can, cursing each other and me for walking slow enough to enjoy the colored lights strung up in dirty windows. Happy fucking holidays.

Much as they bitch, their expressions change and they apologize as soon as they get a good look at me. I half regret that, not out of some fucked up guilt complex but because it's getting too easy. Six months ago, I'd have had to break some bones or draw some blood to get the proper respect, because six months ago I still attempted the occasional polite smile. But now, now they don't fuck with me anymore. Amazing, how much you can communicate with just your facial expression.

Colored lights only hold their appeal for so long. Maybe I'll go home, watch the Breakfast Club and be marginally content. Marginal is as close as I'm getting. I should call Mom, but I probably wouldn't get an answer so I won't bother. Her non-fuckup children will be there; she doesn't need to be bothered by the one she had to summarily toss out.

Great. More depression. Forget being content, I'm going to get off-my-ass drunk.

I pull out of the way of some woman trying to drag a toddler with one hand and a stroller with the other, turn on my heel and –

Trip.

Only a brick wall and my reflexes keep me from falling on my face. I turn, snarling, ready to throw a punch, and scowl at the leg stretched out from the alley and the bundle of clothes attached to it. I wait for the stammered apology.

A dirty, pale hand emerges from the clothes and reaches up to tug back a hood, exposing an equally dirty face. A kid, skinny and hard-eyed and no more than fifteen, at the most, glares up at me. His voice is rough from smoke and cold when he snaps, "Watch where you're fucking stepping, lardass!"

For a few seconds, I'm not sure whether to kick him or laugh. Finally, I settle on taking a step back, out of the flow of traffic. In one quick motion he's on his feet, all nervous tension and bravado in the set of his mouth. His ragged clothes and worn knit hat can't be enough to keep out the chill. His fingers are white and his lips are almost blue. "What the fuck you looking at, bitch? You wanna start something? Just cause you're all big and shit! I can take you! C'mon, motherfucker!" He lifts his fists.

Apparently I don't have to go home to be entertained. Leaning against the wall, I narrow my eyes at him and keep enjoying my cigarette without making a move or saying a word.

And, as expected, it throws him off.

Relaxing enough that he stops bouncing on his toes, he tilts his head and squints at me, so bewildered that he holds still for a moment. I had a kitten when I was kid, one my brothers liked to kick the shit out of, used to look at me that way whenever the status quo, such as human contact equals pain, was shaken up. It's an expression that doesn't last long on this kid's face, which quickly tightens into something like resignation. 

"Quit looking at me like you wanna get in my ass." There's an edge to his voice now that makes him sound older than he looks. The fists drop. "I don't do that shit. Best you're gonna get is a twenty for head, and bitch, that better be up front."

The look of disgusted horror on my face makes him ease down, just out of reach, clutching his thin, tattered jacket over his stomach. His hands are bony. I wonder when he last ate. I wonder why I care.

"You ain't one of those religious fucks, are ya?" Taking my silence as an affirmative answer, he makes an explosive hand gesture and nearly yells in frustration, "I told you people – "

It's a good thing I waited to move. Just my straightening up makes his teeth click shut, his eyes wide and wary. I move forward one step, wait for him to stop trying to back through the wall, and point at the coffee shop across the street.

He blinks, then demands distrustfully, "What?"

Okay. Let's try that again. I point at him, then at myself, then at the coffee shop again.

Something shifts slightly, behind his eyes. "You wanna buy me coffee."

I nod.

"Why the fuck do you wanna buy me coffee?"

I shrug.

Looking cagey, he eyes me, then glances across the street. I can see the hunger battling with the suspicion. He's quiet, lips drawn into a thin line. Then he sighs, his shoulders slumping for a moment before he steels himself and looks back up at me. There's a desperate sort of mask written on his face as he shrugs and informs me with angry dignity, "Hell. Fine. But you ain't giving me no hot beef injection, coffee or no."

Something about the way he moves across the street like an old man, stiff and a little shaky, convinces me to tell the waitress to bring half the menu along with the coffee. I settle for a sandwich I'm not going to eat and watch as he wolfs down a bowl of soup. He eats like he's afraid someone's going to take it away, his eyes darting up every time I move to put a french fry in my mouth. I pretend I don't see him flinching.

He looks like he's been on the street for a while. His cheekbones are too sharp, and he's filthy. I'm not sure what color his hair was originally, but it's lank and greasy now, dangling limply to his shoulders. He has a fresh cut on one cheek and the remains of a black eye. The smell on him keeps the waitress at a distance.

One bowl of soup, two hot sandwiches and an order of fries later, he shoves the plates out of reach, his hands folded over his stomach. With the edge of hunger off him, he looks even younger. Tired dark eyes glance at me, then away, out the window. The crowds on the streets are thinning out, finally. "Bum a smoke off you?"

I light one and hand it over without a word, both of us ignoring the dirty look it gets from the waitress. He doesn't thank me, just draws on it for a while. When he suddenly jerks into motion, his hands waving around for emphasis, it makes me start half up in the booth. "You can fucking talk to me, you know. I ain't stupid or contagious. You can't make yourself homeless by association."

"I don't talk. As a general rule." I pick up a fry and bite it in half. It's cold and greasy. "Nothing personal."

"Oh." The kid looks down at the scratched table, then back up at me. "Well. Mind if I ask who the fuck you are?"

"Bob." The coffee's cold, too. Damn, the things I have to do for dramatic effect.

"Bob?" His nose wrinkles, transforming his face, and I get a fleeting glimpse of what a good looking kid he might be if he wasn't covered with filth and burdened with the responsibility of surviving on the street. "Man, to hell with that. How're people supposed to tell you apart from every other tubby bitch named Bob?"

"There's nothing wrong with Bob."

"Sure, if you don't mind having a fucking lawyer's name. Sounds like you got a business degree or some shit like that. You need a new one."

"No I don't."

"And I don't need your goddamned charity, didja think about that?" The kid glowers at me, a raw look in his eye, then turns his head away to stare out the window at a stray cat loping between cars to cross the street. "I don't want you thinking I owe you or nothing. Cause I don't. This was your fucking idea, not mine."

I don't say anything, because there's nothing to say. Wasting words on this situation would probably only make it worse.

Flicking his eyes away from the window, he considers me for a moment. Then his lips twist into something close to a smile. He grinds the cigarette out on the plastic tabletop, then tosses the butt into my coffee. "Silent Bob. There. You get your name, I get my food, everybody's fucking happy." 

He gets to his feet and I wait long enough for him to fix his coat around so none of the tears in it are sitting over bare skin. Then I ask "Where are you going?"

"Ain't none of your business, bitch." Combing his fingers through his hair, he makes a face when they come away greasy. He looks at his hand for a moment, at the grime and the dirt, and pain flicks through his eyes for a split second. It's gone when he raises his head, but it was there. It was there. "And stop fucking staring at me! I told you, I ain't gonna let you up my ass – " 

His attention suddenly turns from me to the guy in the booth across the aisle, who's watching him with fairly obvious disdain. "Yeah, what the fuck you looking at, huh?"

In about two seconds, he's going to start something. Well fed or not, the guy in the booth could take him down, so I stand up myself, making his head snap back around to me. Kid's got the attention span of a ferret on speed. I ask the first thing that comes to mind, and wince. There's a reason I don't fucking talk. "Is it my business to ask what your name is?"

The kid eyes me hard, shifting back and forth restlessly from one foot to the other. If he's always in this much motion, he'll burn off that food pretty quick. "No. It ain't. But seeing as it's Christmas and all," and his smirk is somewhere between bitter and genuine, "I'll tell you anyway." Fussing with the hat shoved down almost to his eyes, he walks backwards to the door decorated with cracked glass and a paper snowflake. "People call me Jay."

Jay. Same as the noisy, raucous birds that used to tempt Mom's cats close and then fly away, laughing. Yeah. That fits.

His back hits the glass. He leans against the door, blocking the way, and offers me a lazy grin. "Merry Christmas, Silent Bob."

The door swings open and he steps backward out into the cold without tripping. It's starting to snow, somehow, whiting out the windows, carried on harsh winds that make Jay stagger on the sidewalk. He turns around, hunches his shoulders, buries his hands in his pockets, and starts walking for parts unknown. I sit back down in the warmth of the coffee shop and watch him go, not really sure why, until I can't see him anymore.

That smart ass grin . . . 

Yeah. No way in hell he's going to survive the winter. Hell, I doubt he'll survive the week. I won't be seeing that one again.

I don't wanna think about how much that bothers me. So I don't. Merry fucking Christmas, indeed.


	2. Two

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Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

TWO

I roll over in bed and stare at the clock. Five nineteen a.m. It's been three days since I stepped on that kid in the shopping district. I haven't slept well since. Fuck, just because I put a hot meal in his belly doesn't mean he's my responsibility but somehow this fact escapes my conscience. Like me, it hasn't said much the last few years, so when it does speak, it's hard to ignore. 

Digging the remote out from under my pillow, I turn on the television just in time to catch the weather forecast for the week. A reporter is standing outside, getting thrashed by the wind while his loafers soak up the dirty slush which remains of the snow. They're predicting record lows and the mayor's feigning concern for the homeless. Too few shelters and too many street people equal bad press when the temperature dips below freezing and folks end up dead because they've got nowhere warm to sleep.

Not my problem, I tell the knawing in the pit of my stomach. Hard enough to get him into that coffee shop. No stretch to think he'd prefer frostbite to an offer of a night on my couch. And how the fuck would I find him, anyway? Look under "Jay" in the phone book?

I swallow hard and throw the remote at the television, drag myself out of the bed. Since when do I give a fuck about anybody else, anyway? Bob comes first, second and last. Didn't Christmas prove the wisdom in that? Came and went without a visit from Santa Claus, or anybody else, just like the three Christmases before it.

The rent's due in a few days. I gotta scare up some cash. After a quick shower, I throw on my clothes, lock up my apartment and walk to the Denny's around the corner. Some pancakes, hot coffee and a cigarette get me going. I use the pay phone to call around and find out who needs my services today. I don't have to search too hard.

People get caught up in the frenzy of the holidays. Some of them forget they owe money. Some of them assume their creditors have the Christmas spirit and withhold a payment. Either way, the debt has to be collected. That's where my skill at intimidation turns from hobby to vocation.

Downtown is five minutes by bus and I'm stepping off into one of our city's more notorious neighborhoods by seven o'clock. It's a little early for this kind of thing but I look at the hour as an asset rather than a liability. Surprise is always an advantage.

All eyes shift to me when I enter the lobby of a shabby hotel. The junkies are looking for their connections and the crazies want to make sure I'm not a Martian or a CIA agent. A couple of hookers are already dressed for work and they smile at me and wink. I smile back non chalantly. Not touching that with a ten foot pole. 

Double checking the room number on the crumpled napkin in my pocket, I head upstairs. I strong-arm the door to find a guy bigger than me cowering in the corner. Doesn't take any work to get the cash out of him, he seems to be expecting me, appropriately contrite, shoving a fat envelope into my hand and begging me to pass along his apologies to our mutual friend. 

"I swear to God, it's all there, all of it, please tell him, tell him I'm sorry and I won't be late again." I just squint and draw on my cigarette. I count the money twice. Nodding, I leave, pulling my cut out of the thick wad of bills and sliding it into a hidden pocket inside my coat as I exit the building.

  
Four more pickups go just as uneventfully. Some of these folks have met me before. Like I said, too easy. Finally, around three o'clock, I'm done and glad for it, the wind cutting through me and whipping my trench coat around like a black canvas flag. My "friend" offers me a beer and a sit down when I drop off the money, but it's just a courtesy and he nods when I shake my head. 

Walking the two blocks to the bus stop with the chill still slicing me, anticipating the few more blocks I'll have to walk when I get back to my part of town, I pat the stash in my hidden pocket and consider waving down a taxi. 

And then I hear a scratchy, strained voice that sounds familiar.

"Get off me! Get the fuck off me, you horny bastard, I told you I ain't down with that shit!" I hesitate, wondering if I'm a little off my rocker, having guilty hallucinations. "I got a blade, you cock smoker, I'll fucking use it, I swear!" 

It's not a hallucination, and it's coming from an alley not ten feet away. I shake my head at the quirky stubbornness of God or fate or whatever it is that's throwing me into this kid's path again, and move toward his voice. I slip down between two buildings and around a stinking dumpster that hides the scuffle I hear progressing.

My conscience couldn't have manufactured a more inflammatory scene. There Jay is, flailing around on his stomach, pinned to the ground by a man more than twice his size. His hat flies off and his hair drops into his face. One meaty hand is already clamped over his loud mouth, louder than this brute had probably anticipated, and the other is yanking at the waistband of his torn jeans.

I run up behind the guy, who's so busy trying to wrestle Jay's pants off that he doesn't notice me, and I clench my hands together like I'm holding a bat. I take a wide, enthusiastic swing and connect with the side of his head. Nothing happens for a minute, but I don't wait for him to turn on me. I throw another two handed punch, and this time he topples over.

The kid is springing to his feet before his attacker hits the ground, taking cover behind the dumpster. Taking nothing for granted myself, I kick the creep in the stomach a couple of times before I'm satisfied that he's out cold. I lean over, panting, catching my breath. Shit I'm out of shape.

When I stand back up, Jay is edging out of the shadows, fumbling to get his hat back on, his eyes wide and his limbs shaking as he stares at the beast that was trying to rip him a new asshole. The fear is plain on his smudged face and I realize the shock hasn't worn off yet because he isn't trying to hide it. Finally he looks up.

"Well if it ain't that tubby bitch, Silent Bob!" Just like that, the mask is on, but not firmly enough to hide his relief at finding a relatively friendly face instead of an unknown quantity. I nod and a smile escapes my own mask. "Shit, what you been doing, Silent Bob, following me around like a fucking puppy?"

I shrug.

"You didn't have to do that, you know, you crazy fuck, I knew what I was doing." He circles the human lump on the asphalt, giving it a respectfully wide berth. "I can take care of myself, you know." Maybe he's fronting for my sake or maybe he's trying to convince himself. Either way, I don't argue.

The days since I saw him last have obviously been rough. The tattered coat is gone, two or three layers of knit shirts the only thing between him and the weather. His face has seen some action, day old bruises and a split lip have joined what's left of the black eye and the scab on his cheek. His encounter with the incredible bulk has left a few marks too, his knuckles bloody and his chin scraped raw. He sniffs and drags a filthy gray sleeve across the injury, blinking at the bright red smear it leaves.

"We should get the fuck out of Dodge before this freak wakes up." he says sensibly. I nod and he follows me out of the alleyway and onto the sidewalk. I watch him from the corner of my eye as I make my way quickly down the street and into a sleazy pub. He follows, hands shoved into the warmth of his armpits, shivering.

"What the fuck is this place? You gonna buy me some more coffee, lunchbox?" I shake my head and point toward the door. "Yeah, I guess, good enough place to hide for a few minutes. Just in case." I'm amazed at how accurately he's interpreted my gesture and I smile. But that brings the guarded look back to his face and he wipes his chin again.

"Sure, yeah, you think I owe you something, now, huh? Like I said, I coulda handled that fucker myself, didn't need you to jump in and play Superman." He shakes his head and rolls his eyes, disappointment settling over his features. "Why else you been following me around? Just like everybody else, ain't you, waiting for the right time to take your shot. Fine. Let's make a deal, then, Monty Hall. What you want? And you remember, tubby, I ain't taking it up the ass."

Talk about a one track mind. I sigh, frustrated, before remembering that's exactly what he was just fighting so hard to avoid. Living out here in the street, young and skinny and for all appearances defenseless, what's just happened is probably a constant threat.

I watch his eyes as I contemplate all this and see that same pain flick across them that I saw the other night. Can't quite keep my gaze disinterested. It's not pity I'm feeling, more like grief or sadness, and I'm vaguely surprised at the depth of it, considering I've spent a total of an hour and half with this kid. He sees it in my face but doesn't erupt as I would expect. He doesn't react at all.

"Like I said, pal, let's get this over with, cause I've gotta get my shit together. It's gonna be colder than a witch's tit tonight and I gotta find a place to crash. I ain't got time to be negotiating with you all day."

"I'll have to think about it." I say, trying to buy time. "Meanwhile, you're mine." A ludicrous line, even coming from me, with my carefully constructed tough guy facade, and I'm surprised when he doesn't fall to the floor laughing. Instead, he nods, albeit reluctantly. 

How often has he been kicked in the teeth, that he would buy this bullshit from me and submit to God only knows what kind of crap I have to dish out? Just to settle a street debt. He must be awfully damn close to the end of his rope.

I shake off the morose thought and head toward the door. Jay follows. I hail a taxi and we get in. He sits as far away from me on the seat as he can, arms wrapped around his stomach as he stares out the window at the passing scenery, curiously quiet as the rows of seedy motels and strip clubs give way to the more suburban landscape of grocery stores and real estate offices, houses and trees, even a playground or two left empty due to the vicious winds.

Jay seems to have shaken his own moodiness by the time we pull up in front of my apartment building. He jumps out and stretches his legs while I pay the driver, adjusts his cap and surveys his surroundings.

"You live here Silent Bob? This your place?" I nod. "Fuck, this is some depressing shit, man. No wonder you keep coming downtown, looking for action." I wonder if he's being ironic and decide he's just trying to stir the shit. At least he's talking again. Somehow I'm relieved.

He starts checking the place out as if he's casing it as soon as we get inside. Or maybe he's just looking for escape routes should I turn on him unexpectedly. Or maybe it's a little of both. I realize that I might just wake up tomorrow minus a few electronics. I silently curse my uncharacteristic naivete. Better keep a close watch on him.

It's somewhere near five o'clock now and I haven't had anything to eat since breakfast. Unlikely Jay's eaten lately, so I dig around in the fridge and throw some cold cuts and cheese on the countertop that separates the tiny kitchen from the living room. He stares at the food then looks back at me. 

"You feeding me again?" I nod. He lifts one eyebrow and bounces around restlessly. "You think this shit's funny, jerking me around? S'a real good joke, Silent Bob, jerking me around like a little bitch on a string. You better just fucking tell me what the fuck you want, or I'm outta here." He backs towards the door, suspicious and ready to bolt, perhaps feeling the vulnerability of being shut inside with me.

"Just relax, motormouth." I say quietly, carefully, continuing about the business of setting up a snack, putting out bread and condiments. He pauses halfway between me and the only exit, muscles taut to the point he seems to be vibrating. "I'm fucking hungry, ok? You don't want to eat, you don't have to eat. Doesn't matter to me."

More and more he reminds me of that kitten, always hiding under the furniture at the sound of footsteps. Took a while for that ball of fur to decide who was friend and who was foe, and until he did, he reacted to us all like we were deadly. Couldn't blame him. Five pairs of feet in the house, and all but mine were either kicking him, pushing him out of the way, or stepping on his tail. 

Eventually that cat figured out he could trust me, that I was the one person in his little universe that wasn't out to get him. Not that it mattered. He ran out in front of a car trying to get away from my brother and just like that he was dead. Harsh wakeup call for a ten year old who had a penchant for lost causes. 

Apparently I didn't learn my lesson.

Jay, still hovering in the hallway, watches as I make a couple of thick sandwiches and slide them across the counter toward him. When I move into the living room with my own dinner, he goes into the kitchen and washes his hands. He gulps down the food, just like the other night, keeping a cautious eye on me the whole time.

He'll eat, he'll sleep and he'll be gone in the morning. I can't save him, anymore than I could've saved that cat, but at least right now he's not hungry, he's not somebody's bitch, and he's not going to freeze to death anytime in the next eight hours. Maybe my conscience will shut the fuck up and I can get some sleep tonight, too.


	3. Three

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Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

THREE

I don't know about this guy. He's sitting over there, all cool and shit, eating his ham and cheese on white. I ain't been able to figure him out yet. Stepped all in my shit the other night and that look on his face, big bearded mother fucker in a trench coat, I figured that was the end of me. I jumped up to defend myself, I ain't gonna just lay there and get the crap kicked out of me, but he seemed to think that was funny. 

Not that he was laughing. Just lost that nasty frown and smoked his cigarette. Yeah, he thought it was funny, big mother fucker like him looking at a skinny little shit like me, but he don't know me. He don't know I been handling myself on the street a long time now and I got some moves on me. How else you think I've lived this long, if I ain't got moves?

So he didn't kick my ass and instead he bought me something to eat. I didn't trust that shit, no way, nobody gives you something for nothing in this world, that's for fucking sure, but he didn't ask for his up front. Thought I was getting over, getting out of that diner with my belly full, without having to take it in the mouth. 

Thought that'd be the end of it, until I saw him today, wandering around downtown looking all tough and mean. Shit, figured he was looking to collect, maybe he was fucking stalking me. People do that shit you know, get all obsessed, follow somebody around, and then fuck 'em up when it don't work out. Maybe I don't look like much, at least not the way I am now, all dirty and beat up, but there ain't ever been no shortage of perverts trying to climb into my ass.

I was hoping he wouldn't find me, sticking to the alleys, pulling my hat down low and watching for him real careful. Didn't keep me from trying to make some money, though, cause I knew it was gonna get cold tonight, cold enough to freeze my ass to death if I didn't find someplace warm to crash. So I was making money for a cheap hotel room the fastest way I knew how.

That fucking gorilla, that big dopey moron, acting like he'd settle for head and pay me what I asked until he got me back behind that dumpster, and then he starts fucking grabbing my package and trying to stick his hand in my shorts. I'll do alot of shit I don't want to for money, when I need it bad enough, but I don't take it up the ass and I don't let nobody grab my shit.

But he was big and fuck if he wasn't fast too, and he had me kissing the concrete before I knew it. Couldn't breathe with his big fucking paw over my face, and the way he was pulling my head back, I thought for a minute, he might just fucking kill me by accident, break my neck or suffocate me while he was trying to stuff himself up my ass.

And then who turns up but Silent Bob, that crazy bitch, with his backwards baseball cap and his bad ass trench coat, looked like a fucking ten-cent superhero standing there, except he was panting like he just came off a fucking marathon. What the fuck was I supposed to think about that?

It just gets weirder every minute, I can tell you that. Yanks me out of danger, takes me home with him and feeds me again. I don't think he's from no church or no charity, not the way he was walking himself around town like a bad ass, looking all tough, but he don't act like no pervert I've ever run into before either. He don't look at me like I got the plague, either, like most people do. I don't know what to think. 

I don't want to take nothing more than I have to, but it's gonna be so fucking cold tonight and I didn't make any money today to buy me a night inside anywheres. Fuck, I ain't even got my coat anymore, last time I shut my eyes for more than two seconds, some asshole was ripping it off of me. I tried to hang onto it, it was the warmest thing I had, I fought that fucker hard, but he was stronger than me. Busted my fucking lip, too. 

I ain't seen a mirror in awhile, much less a bar of soap. I must look like a fucking reject. No telling how many marks I got on me by now, and I know I'm a fucking pig sty. I hate that shit. I hate being all fucking dirty. But when you ain't got someplace warm to crash, you can't get wet, not even just your face in the sink inside the bus station bathroom, cause the minute you step back outside you got that fucking wind blowing on you and you're twice as cold as you were before.

Maybe Silent Bob'll let me take a shower. Fuck, that would be the bomb, if I could take a hot shower, get this stink off of me, wash my hair. It's my best feature, all long and blonde and wavy, when it's clean. It ain't been clean in real long fucking time.

I look over at him. He's sitting there on his couch, it's a nice couch too, looks like maybe it's leather, he's sitting there all quiet with his empty plate. I'm done eating so I put my plate in the sink. I been on the street a long time, but I ain't no animal, you know. I know how to act. I walk into the living room with my hands stuck in my pockets and look around. Silent Bob's got some nice shit, nice TV, nice stereo.

He's watching me, he knows I'm looking at his shit, probably thinks I'm gonna try and lift some of it, but like I said, I ain't no animal. I don't steal from just anybody. Sure, if somebody fucks me over, I might boost some of their shit, but Silent Bob's been straight up with me so far. What kind of asshole would I be, to take shit from him? I got morals. They ain't as tight assed as some people's, but I got 'em.

"Hey Silent Bob, you think maybe I could take a shower?" He raises his eyebrows and thinks about it for a second, like it's a big surprise I'd ask. "What the fuck, you think I like being all dirty and shit? Just cause I live out on the street and I ain't got no bathtub don't mean I like it that way, don't mean I like walking around smelling like somebody's gym socks. Fuck."

Now he's smiling at me. He don't look so scary when he smiles, he looks like a nice guy, somebody that might have a straight job and a couple of kids he likes enough not to knock around. There's people like that in the world. I've never met 'em, but I know they're out there, one or two anyway.

Course, I ain't counting on Silent Bob being one of them.

He nods at me about the shower and shows me where the bathroom is, off the one little bedroom in this joint. He digs around in the bedroom closet and comes out with a towel and a washcloth. They even match. He hands 'em to me and waves at the bathroom, then leaves. Cool.

I lock the bathroom door behind me, that's for sure, I don't care how nice he comes off, I ain't taking no chances, especially while I'm gonna be all naked and wet. Fuck no. I peel off all my clothes, my hat, my shoes all beat to hell and my socks full of holes, all my shirts and my fucked up jeans, and that underwear, fuck, maybe I should just throw that shit away. Yeah. I better throw it away. I toss it in the trash can.

Water's so hot, feels so fucking good, standing there letting it run and run and run. You know how long it's been since I had a shower? Since I was really warm, all the way down to my fucking bones? I scrub every inch of skin I got, every crack and crevice. Twice. I brush my teeth real good with the washcloth. I spend a long time on my hair cause it's a real mess and I really want it to look good. I know it won't stay that way, shit, I won't be on the street two nights before I'll be looking like a trash heap again, but it don't matter. Even if I just look good for an hour, it's worth it.

I stay in there as long as I can, until all that hot water runs out. It ain't till I'm standing there on Silent Bob's little foot shaped bathmat (matches the towel and the washcloth too, how about that shit?) that I realize all I got to put back on is those fucking shitty clothes. Fuck, I hate that. Then I nearly jump out of my skin cause Silent Bob is knocking on the bathroom door.

"I've got some old clothes you can wear." Shit, is he fucking psychic, or what? "I'll leave them on the bed. They're not much and they'll probably be too big, but they're clean. You can wash your clothes tomorrow, if you want, I'll show you the laundry room." 

That's the most he's said at one time since he stepped on me the other day! "Yeah, ok. That'd be cool. Like I said, it ain't like I enjoy being all dirty." I finish drying off and open the door a little. He's gone and the bedroom door is closed. I step over there real quick and lock it, just in case.

Track pants, a long sleeved t-shirt, both black, a pair of socks and a pair of tighty whities are on the bed. Lunchbox was right, they're a little big, but not by too much, and I put them on and walk around a second. Feels good to be clean and wearing clean clothes. First time in months. I go back into the bathroom and find a blow dryer and a hairbrush.

Yeah, yeah, may seem like a waste of time, but if I'm gonna do this, I might as well do it right. Looking in the mirror for the first time, though, that ain't so funny. I'm fucking hideous. I almost wish I hadn't looked. Look like I went a few rounds with fucking Mike Tyson, I got so many bruises and cuts. My fucking busted lip, the scab on my cheek, the bottom of my chin . . . and I didn't realize I'd lost so much weight. I could be fucking anorexic, the way I look, can see all the bones through my skin.

Fuck.

That really gets to me, more than anything, that gets to me, looking at myself in the mirror and seeing what I see. I used to be fucking good looking, you know, back when I was still living in foster homes and going to school, girls were always checking me out. I had plenty of action.

But I been on the street about a year now and I guess this is what happens. You don't eat enough, you don't sleep enough, and you get your ass kicked every couple of days, this is what you look like.

I feel like I might cry, I really do, like a little bitch with a skinned knee. What a pussy. Get it together, Jay. What are you, a fucking loser? I turn my back on the fucked up guy in the mirror. What good's it gonna do, to stand there and feel sorry for yourself and cry like a fucking baby? I bite my lip and sniff alot and swallow a few times until the lump in my throat goes away.

I dry my hair without turning back around and clean up after myself. Hang up the towel, put away the dryer and the brush, bundle up my dirty clothes. Forget what I saw in the mirror. Won't make that mistake again.

Silent Bob's sitting in his recliner when I come back out and there's a sheet and a blanket and a pillow on the nice leather couch. He looks up and makes a weird face. "What the fuck you looking at, bitch?" I say. "You think I don't know what I look like? All fucked up? Quit fucking staring at me." He looks like I offended him for some reason, and shakes his head real hard. "Oh I don't look like a fucking train wreck then?" He shakes his head again. "You're fucking blind, Silent Bob, on top of being fat and retarded and who knows what else."

His eyebrows come together and he tilts his head at me. Geez, this fucker can say alot without talking. "Yeah, ok, fuck, so I'm being an asshole and all you've done is be nice to me. Well don't think I'm buying that line of shit, cause I ain't. I ain't got you figured out yet, I don't know what gets you off about all this, but I'm watching you. You ain't catching me by surprise." He keeps staring at me awhile and don't say nothing. 

Is he pissed off? Is he thinking about how fun it's gonna be to kick my ass and leave me out in the street like a fucking human popsicle? But finally he looks away, at the TV, and turns it on with a remote control. I stand there a little longer with the adrenaline rush still pushing through my veins, my heart beating fast, ready to run or to take him on, whichever I gotta do. Then he looks at me again and shakes his head, waves at the couch.

Fine, he's gonna play it all cool, so can I. I fix up the sheet and lay down, roll up inside the blanket so he can't pull it off of me without waking me up, and settle down wheres I can see him and the TV at the same time. I ain't seen TV in a long time. You forget about shit like that when you're busy surviving from day to day, but I really miss it. He flips channels and I start running my mouth about everything that rolls by, mostly cause I like to talk, but also cause I want to try and stay awake as long as I can. 

Shit, it's early, I know he ain't gonna go to sleep before I do, I got maybe five minutes before I pass out, I'm so fucking tired, but I stretch it out as long as I can and I keep my eye on him. He seems to be getting a kick out of me and my big mouth, he's sitting over there laughing. He ain't making any noise, crazy fuck, but he's got one of those big grins on his face and his belly's shaking.

Like I said, he seems like a decent guy, but then again, some of those fucking foster families seemed decent too, right up till the minute "dad" or "big brother" turned up in the middle of the night, trying to slide between the sheets and show me their fucking boner. 

I wouldn't be here if I didn't have to be. If it wasn't so cold outside, I wouldn't take the risk. But sometimes you got to choose between the frying pan and the fire and hope you don't wake up with somebody's cock in your mouth.


	4. Four

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

FOUR

Today started out nice for a change. Nice shit don't happen to me too often. 

Wasn't a perfect night, didn't sleep too well, had a fucking nightmare, same one as always, guy chasing me, faceless and big and stinks like a mother fucker, wants to put his piece up my ass. Sometimes he does it before I can open my eyes, sometimes he don't, either way I wake up breathing hard and my ass hurting. Sorry to say the pain ain't just speculation on my part, I know what the fuck it feels like to have somebody shove it up my brown eye while I'm squirming, trying to get away.

But I rolled over, took some deep breaths and went back to sleep.

Woke up again when it was light out to the smell of bacon frying, noises in the kitchen letting me know where Silent Bob was, and what did that fucker do but come out there carrying a plate full of breakfast and a cup of hot chocolate – hot fucking chocolate, I ain't had hot fucking chocolate since I was a little kid. It was good too, same as the eggs and hot sauce and bacon and tomatoes and toast.

Suspicious? Fuck yeah, I was still suspicious, watching that tubby bitch's every move, but what was I supposed to do, sit there with my fucking stomach howling and growling and just stare at that hot food, listening to Silent Bob while he shoveled it in? Fuck no. I ate it.

Yeah, I know what you're thinking, skinny little street rat, fucking Oliver Twist and shit, has to depend on the fucking kindness of strangers like this mysterious bastard, but I do alright most of the time. Fuck charity anyways and the people that want to give it to you, patting you on the back and then rushing off to wash their hands cause they're too good to touch you. I ain't seen that look on Silent Bob's face, but if I did, I wouldn't take one fucking bite, no matter how hungry I was.

Did the dishes when I got done eating, that way we were even. Silent Bob looked embarrassed and tried to wave me off. Then we negotiated about the laundry. I had a couple dollars stuffed up in the lining of my hat and I made him give me quarters for 'em. Like I said, I don't take fucking charity.

Now we're sitting in the laundry room and my clothes are rolling around in the washer. Ain't gonna get too clean, only so much a scoop of soap and some hot water can do for threads like the ones I got, but at least they won't stink for a while.

Silent Bob gives me a cigarette, lights one for himself and we both start blowing smoke rings. I jump around the fucking tiny room, I hate being shut up inside anywheres this small, and I'm singing, banging on the windows, acting goofy and running my mouth like I always do. He's laughing. That's cool.

Some chick comes in, nice tits, pretty face, carrying a basket of dirty laundry. "Hey baby, what's up?" I say, looking her up and down, giving her a smile. She rolls her eyes and ignores me. "Yeah, baby, I understand, you ain't gotta say no more, it's my friend, here, right? Gives you the creeps." I nod at Silent Bob. He sighs real loud and makes eye contact with the skirt, shakes his head, shrugs, waves both hands.

"What's with the juvenile delinquent, Bob?" she says to him. Guess they know each other.

"Forget about him, baby," I tell her, "It's all about you and me now, know what I'm saying?"

"Fuck off." she says. She's finished loading up her clothes now, turned on the machine, and she slams the lid and gives me the finger. "See you later, Bob." she says to him. I follow her as far as the door, sniffing at her, watching her ass shake while she crosses the parking lot. Sexy. Real sexy. When I look back at Silent Bob, he ain't smiling.

"Ah, fuck you, tubby." I say, dropping the butt of the cigarette and grinding it into the floor with my heel, cause the rest of my shoe has so many holes in it I'd burn my fucking foot otherwise. The washer stops.

Once I get the dryer going, Silent Bob stands up and crushes out his own cigarette. He opens his mouth for the first time today. "This thing will take a half hour at least. Let's grab a pizza." I check out his face real careful, trying to get a read like I have a hundred fucking times already and I don't see nothing new. Might as well get one more meal under my belt before I'm back out in the cold.

"Ok fine, but no fucking anchovies."

We walk about a block to a pizza place. It's early, enough that we're the only customers, and the pie, a large loaded with just about everything _but _anchovies, comes out quick. Silent Bob orders a pitcher of Coke. Like usual, I keep my eye on him while I eat. When you're used to digging through trash cans and dumpsters for your dinner, and used to guys bigger than you taking what half eaten crap you do find, makes you a little jumpy.

Silent Bob only gets one slice of pizza down before he decides it's time to talk.

"I've figured out what I want." Oh fuck, here it comes. I wait for the hammer to drop. "Answers to a couple of questions." Oh yeah, now I know where we're headed.

"Sure, you nosy bitch, a couple of questions." I put down my pizza. "What's your name, kid, and where'd you come from? How do I get ahold of your folks? You're gonna do me a big favor and send me back to wherever it is you think I belong, maybe juvy lockup, huh? Forget it. I ain't telling you shit."

Silent Bob sips his drink, looks at me for a minute, and I can feel my hands shaking under the table, my neck and shoulders tightening, my body making ready one more time for whatever shit I might've stirred up.

"What, do you think I'm gonna ask for your fucking social security number?" he says finally. He shakes his head, lights a cigarette, blows smoke from the side of his mouth. "I just want to know a little bit more about this skinny kid I keep running into. Shouldn't be too hard, you like to talk enough." I frown at him. "It's better than the alternative, isn't it? Or would you rather be my bitch?"

He ain't being serious, is he? But then he breaks into a grin. "You fucker." I say, relieved, muscles relaxing, breathing a little deeper. "You think you're a laugh riot, don't you, tubby?" He nods. I can't help smiling a little. "You should stick to your fucking quiet routine, talking don't suit you." Now Silent Bob is the one frowning and I smile a little more. I go back to my pizza and take a drink of my Coke. "Alright then, let's play. Make with the fucking questions. Maybe I'll tell you the truth, maybe I won't. You ain't gonna know the difference." 

Settling down sideways in the booth, Silent Bob clears his throat. "How old are you?"

Ain't gonna do me any good to lie on this one. I already know, I look my fucking age. "Fourteen." He makes a face but not a comment.

"How long you been on the street?"

Don't see how he could use it against me, so again, I decide to go with the truth. "Almost a year this time. Since last winter."

  
"What do you mean 'this time'?" he says. I answer him through a mouthful of pepperoni.

"I took off a few times before, but they always found me. I got better at it."

"What are you running from?" Now he's getting to the point. I chew a while, drink a while, think a while. He's not looking at me, he's staring out the window, at cars going by outside this shitty suburban pizza joint. What the fuck, why not?

"Foster homes, group homes." I say. "Supposed to be safe, but they ain't. This one lady, she liked to whack me with an electric chord when I got out of line. I could fucking live with that once in a while, for a warm bed and three squares a day, if that was as bad as it got, but it wasn't." I sneak another look. He's still watching the traffic, but I know he's listening. "The last place, there was three of us foster kids, all of us older, hard cases. But the dad in that joint, that bastard, it was me he liked the best. Liked me better than his fucking wife, know what I'm saying?"

Cars ain't so interesting anymore. He's looking at me. I stare back. When I see he understands, I go back to eating.

"Why were you in foster care?" Silent Bob says. Answer to that question ain't so simple, cause it goes back to the time when I still had a family. How many times have I told this story, to social workers, cops, school counselors, doctors? Usually it don't hurt, but right now it feels like it might.

"Enough about me, lunchbox." I say, stuffing myself with another piece of pizza. "What about you? What's your story? What you doing when you ain't out playing fucking Superman or feeding street rats?" He snorts, blowing smoke through his nose, smiling, and I know he ain't gonna ask me no more questions.

"I collect debts."

"What, you sit at a desk all day, working for like MasterCard or some shit, calling people up and harassing them till they send a check?" Snorts again, really loud this time.

"Um, no. More like I turn up on doorsteps at three a.m. when somebody hasn't paid their dealer."

"No way, bullshit!" I say, and it makes me laugh. Sure, he's big, and I know he could kick my skinny ass without breaking a sweat, but he's more fat than anything else. And far as I can tell, he don't act much like a tough guy. "You, you're muscle for a drug dealer?"

Silent Bob actually looks hurt for a second and then he glares at me, like he's mad. "Hey, listen, fuck you, pal. I'm good at what I do. It pays the rent. I eat just fine."

"Yeah, ok." Thinking back on yesterday, him criss crossing my trashy downtown streets with that mean look and a purpose in his step, makes sense now, he was working. Yeah, ok, I believe him. And I ease up for the first time in a long time, cause I'm real clear now that he wasn't fucking looking for me all day.

Funny thing, you know, when you relax even for a minute, it hits you, all the fucking tension you carry every day, looking over your shoulder, trying to stay ready in case somebody gets rough, sleeping in fucking alleyways and under bridges. If you rest, you fall down. All of a sudden, I'm really fucking tired.

I suck down a glass full of Coke and wipe my hands, rub the grit out of my eyes. Pizza's almost gone, one piece left in the pan. I push up out of the booth. "Looks like lunch is over, tubby. Let's get the fuck out of here." He nods, picks up the last piece and eats it on the walk back to his place.

Clothes are dry now and I take 'em out, take 'em back to his apartment. I'm getting ready to change when Silent Bob tells me not to bother, that this gear I got on hasn't fit him in a long time. I say thanks instead of arguing. Before, I woulda probably made something out of it, but I'm not so cautious right now and besides, I'm too fucking exhausted anyway. He gives me a plastic bag to put my old stuff in and then I take off to the bathroom one last time.

After I do my business, I catch a sideways look at myself in the mirror while I'm washing my hands. Not such a surprise this time, the marks and the circles under my eyes, the sharp angles of my bones, but I still ain't too pretty. Except for my hair. It's enough to make me smile, looking at it. Longest it's ever been, wavy and golden. I find that brush again and hit it few licks, find a rubberband in a drawer and pull it back in a pony tail, cause it'll stay clean longer and won't get tangled. Find my hat in the plastic bag and put it on. Well, fuck. Alright then.

In the hallway by the front door, Silent Bob is standing there, holding a black coat, looks like it's in good shape and must be awful warm. "I've got this coat that doesn't fit. Might as well get some use out of it, it's just gonna gather moths otherwise." I nod, check it out, put it on. Yeah, it's fucking nice, a real nice coat.

"Thanks, man." I say. "Last one got ripped off by some fucking bum while I was trying to sleep. I'll try to hang on to it."

"Oh . . . " Silent Bob says, and then he goes into the kitchen. I follow, watch him writing down a phone number, and then he's holding it out to me. What the fuck am I supposed to do with this? Call him up, invite him out for a fucking beer? I almost start with something, but then I don't. I take the paper and fold it up, stuff it into the lining of my hat, the only place I've been able to keep anything safe since I been on the street.

We shake hands and he opens the front door for me. "Thanks, man." I say one more time. Been a long time since I thanked anybody for anything, much less three times in the same day. He smiles but don't say nothing. I pull up the collar of the coat and take off. I don't look back.

Halfway down the street, headed back toward downtown, I stick my hands in the coat pockets and find a pair of gloves and a ski cap. Fuck. Son of a bitch got one over on me.


	5. Five

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

FIVE

Walking the downtown streets one afternoon, headed over to see one of my many employers, fellow by the name of Tony, and I realize I've got my eyes peeled for Jay. It's been more than a month since I saw him last, walking out of my apartment parking lot, wearing my old coat.

I keep remembering that startled feeling I had when he came into the living room after his shower. Blonde and baby faced under all that grunge, not just a 'kid' but a child, alone on the street since he was twelve or thirteen. My biggest concern at that age was accumulating the ultimate comic book collection while trying to keep my parents from finding out I was failing biology. Well, that, and avoiding the bullies at school.

Weather hasn't improved much. There've been plenty more nights when the temp fell below 30 degrees. The police have found five homeless folk frozen to death so far. Apparently they don't rate the same kind of attention we taxpayers do, a few seconds on the five o'clock news, crammed between the sports scores and the political scandals. No details about their age or appearance. Why bother? No one cares about them, right?

So I'm scanning the crowds as I walk, checking out the individuals sheltering themselves in doorways or under newspapers in the alleys, listening for a familiar voice. Nothing so far.

I gave him my fucking phone number, I try reminding myself. He wouldn't have taken anything more, I was up against a line with the coat and I knew it. Next move, if there's going to be one, is up to him. 

Tony's waiting impatiently when I enter the pub where we've agreed to meet. He's stuffing himself with peanuts, drinking a beer and glaring at me for being – I check my watch – twenty minutes late.

"You think I don't have anything better to do than sit around some dive all day?" he says by way of greeting. He's a big guy, Italian, swears he's not connected, which I hope to God is true. In bed with the mob, that's the last place I need to be. I make myself comfortable and light up a cigarette. Waitress zooms in the moment I'm settled. "He'll have what I'm having." Tony says. When I've got a bottle in my hand, he starts in with a list of 'clients' he'd like me to visit.

It's the same people every damn time he talks to me, and I wonder why the fuck he doesn't just cut them off. They always pay up eventually, but is the interest he charges them really enough to make up for the time and energy he wastes in the pursuit of it? But I don't complain. It bankrolls my luxurious lifestyle, after all.

Just as I'm getting ready to leave, standing up, putting my coat back on, he says, almost as an afterthought, "Oh yeah, there's one more. You probably don't even want to bother with this kid, I'll probably have to send somebody else. There's not much dough in it for you, and he's a real obnoxious little punk."

For some reason, without hearing another word, I stop. I sit back down. I wave at Tony to continue.

"You remember Angela?" I nod. Angela is one of his ex's. He stays in contact with her because she brings him lots of business. "She showed up a few weeks ago with this scrawny kid, long blonde hair, a real smart ass, mouth like a sailor. I fronted him a little weed to sell, on her word, and he made good on it, brought the money on time." Tony stops long enough to order himself another beer and I try to conceal my agitation.

Finally, he continues. "When he knocks on the door a week later, I front him some more product, figure he's good for it, you know, he obviously had some customers first time around and he didn't stiff me. But nothing. I called Angela. She kicked him to the curb. Has some idea where he might be, though. Owes me five bills now, being late. You wanna give it a shot?"

"What's his name?"

"Jay." Could there be more than one obnoxious, foul mouthed, skinny blonde kid named Jay in this city? I enjoy a split second of relief before I sort out the implications of all this. He might be delinquent because he's occupying a drawer in the morgue. If not, he's into a drug dealer for $500. And I'm responsible for bailing him out. If I take a pass, Tony will send someone else, someone who'll rough him up.

"I'll take care of it." I tell him.

A condemned house, that's where Angela told Tony to look, and when I get there, I wince and hope they're wrong. Three stories high, scorch marks arching out of most of the upper floor windows, plastered all over with signs that say DANGER in bright red. Fucking thing looks like it could cave in at any moment. I move around to the back of the building, where boards have been pried away from a door and the caution tape's been torn loose.

It's not nearly as hideous on the inside, if you ignore the smell of charred wood and mildew, and watch your step on the floorboards, half rotted in places by standing water. Judging by the food wrappers, thin, torn blankets and other evidence scattered about not quite randomly, it's a refuge for several people. None of them seems to be around at the moment.

Going room by room, discouraged by the lack of noise, I'm about to leave when I spot an unopened closet. I think of Jay on my couch, sleeping in a fetal position with his back jammed into the armrest. Unlikely he's sleeping, it's not even dark out yet. But he might be hiding in there.

Fully prepared for someone or something to jump out at me, I turn the doorknob. Seeing him is almost anticlimactic. He's sitting up, hugging his knees against his chest, and he's snoring. Must be damned exhausted, I'm invading his sanctuary and he hasn't moved a muscle. Still has the coat, but no gloves. 

I feel like I'm about to rouse a wild animal so I take appropriate precautions, moving back a few feet and kneeling so as not to be too large or too threatening. "Jay?" I say it evenly and not too loudly. Nothing. "Hey, Jay? Wake up." I raise my voice a bit.

That did the trick, a little too well. He jumps, scrambles, tries to scuttle backward. Since he's already against the wall, all he manages to do is smack his head. "Fuck! Back off, back the fuck off!" He's trembling, breathing hard. I don't move or speak, just wait for him to focus his bleary eyes in the dim light.

"Silent Bob?" he asks. Then he smiles. "What the fuck you doing here? How'd you find me?" He adds it up quickly, my silence, my blank expression, my presence. That cynical, suspicious look he's so good at hardens his features. "You fucker. You're on the job, aren't you? That fucking no neck drug dealer sent you."

He sounds awful, more hoarse than I remember, and I want to blow my nose just listening to him. No wonder he was sleeping, and so soundly. He's sick.

"Might as well go ahead, fat ass," he continues, "Do what you gotta do, cause I ain't got the cash. Think I'd be holding out if I did? Think I'd be squatting in a shit pit like this?" He starts coughing and it's a few minutes before he can stop. While he's still out of breath, I ask what happened.

He shrugs, pulls a handful of fast food napkins out of his pocket, blows and wipes his nose. 

"First time it was easy, I had this chick I was staying with and she took me to a party, sold it all in one night. Fucking bitch kicks me out a few days later. Now all of a sudden I can't give it away. Her friends don't want nothing to do with me and I can't find a corner that ain't already taken. Believe me, I tried." 

He turns his head and points to a huge bruise along his jawline. "One of those fuckers put me in a chokehold, thought he'd pop my head right off at the neck, threatened to do it, too, if I showed my face on his turf again." He sighs, shudders, and coughs again. "What is it now, four or five hundred? What's that worth, Silent Bob? You wanna break a couple of my fingers? Let's get it over with. I ain't gonna try to run, you got me trapped like a fucking rat."

"I'm not gonna kick your ass, Jay." I say. He tilts his head, confused, while I think through our options. I don't have a spare five hundred bucks to pay off his debt. He wouldn't let me if I did. And there's no negotiating with Tony, I've got no leverage. Then it hits me. "You have any of the stuff left, or did you smoke it all yourself?"

Jay rolls his eyes dramatically. "Sure, I took a little off the top, you show me somebody's got a better reason to get high than I do. But I'm a businessman. Weed may be magic, tubby, but it don't turn into a warm bed or hot food till you sell it. I got plenty left."

"You got it on you?"

"What, you think I left it up in the penthouse, with the Playboy bunnies?" he asks, gesturing toward the ceiling. "Course I got it on me." Perfect. I head toward the back door, wave at him to come with me. "What? Where we going? You gonna convince your friend Tony to take back the goods?" I shake my head.

"I have a place." Jay wrinkles up his nose.

"What the fuck are you talking about, a place?" I sigh, frustrated, waving again for him to get off his ass.

"To sell it, dickhead." He raises his eyebrows and his face softens.

"Oh." He nods his head slowly. "Okay."

Last of my pocket change gets us across town on the bus. I watch him as we ride, sniffing and coughing and blowing his nose. I'm no salesman, and I don't know if he can pull this off in the shape he's in. Would I buy anything from a dirty street kid who looks like he might sneeze or barf all over me? Perhaps that's a tad ironic, considering I'm willing to sit next to him on the bus, allow him to sleep on my couch and eat my food. Then again, I'm nuts.

Most people who buy drugs are slightly nuts.

We walk about two blocks from the bus stop, Jay trailing behind me obediently if a little slowly, head down, running into me when I pull up short at our destination. He looks up. He snorts, sneers and shakes his head.

"What the fuck is this place?" I point. Quick Stop Groceries, RST Video and a couple of other small businesses sharing space in a strip mall. I used to work in the Quick Stop when I was sixteen, seventeen years old, after my parents kicked me out. It's a block from my apartment, and it gets a lot of traffic. I've seen a few dealers come and go.

"You want me to sell the shit here? In front of a fucking convenience store? And a video store? You're fucking retarded, Silent Bob." He moves toward the Quick Stop, peers through the windows at the clerk and the two customers inside. "This place is too fucking clean. Nobody's gonna come to a place like this looking for drugs."

"People in the suburbs get high, too." I inform him, lighting up a cigarette and leaning against the length of wall separating the Quick Stop from the video store. Jay stares at me for a bit, then goes to pacing. He sings, hums under his breath, checks out the other businesses, circles the building a couple of times, nervously assessing the territory.

"You sure ain't no cops gonna bother us?" he says, coming to rest beside me. I nod. He keeps glancing around. "If this is such a good spot, then somebody else must already be dealing here." I shrug. I don't know for sure. "What happens if they show up?" he demands. I take a drag off my cigarette, scowl, crack my knuckles. Jay raises his eyebrows and looks me up and down. "Really?" I nod. "Fuck yeah." he says approvingly, nodding, before going into motion again.

It's beginning to get dark but the flow of customers picks up, people getting off work, dropping in for cigarettes or a carton of milk on their way home. Jay seems to handle himself pretty well. He nods at folks as they go by, something shady yet inviting in his manner, in the tilt of his eyes and the set of his mouth. He watches them all, speaks occasionally. After a while he starts asking the odd person if they want to get high.

First sale goes to a guy with curly black hair and a moustache. Jay indicates me when the money comes out. I take it, count it and put it in my inside coat pocket, then Jay produces the weed. Customer goes away happy and we're a few dollars closer to paying off Tony.

A few hours pass, a few more transactions take place. I can see he's worn out, despite his hyperactive bursts of energy. Reminds me of a kid who doesn't want to go to bed, struggling against sleep by bouncing off the walls. 

He follows me inside the convenience store where I grab a cup of coffee for myself, a can of pop for him, a couple of wrapped sandwiches and a bottle of cold medicine. He mouths at the clerk a mile a minute while I pay. He watches the guy, eyes darting around, and stuffs candy into his pockets when he's sure no one's looking. I clear my throat and he stops, shooting me a dirty look.

Once we get back outside, I hand him his sandwich and drink and start walking toward home. Jay eats, comes along without argument. I don't assume I've gained his trust. Fatigue and sickness have just knocked the fight out of him temporarily.

He throws away his trash and washes up when we get to the apartment, drinks some of the cold syrup and sits down on the couch, all without a word. I turn on the TV and then go into the bedroom to get some covers for him. When I get back, he's leaning over sideways, fast asleep. I put a blanket over him and kick back in the recliner.

I take off my coat and pull the money out. Nowhere near $500 yet, but it's a start.


	6. Six

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

SIX

Long night last night. I sat up with the kid, flipping through infomercials. Seemed like the thing to do, he was so sick, not acting like himself. He woke up now and again, always with a panicked, confused look in his eyes, shedding a layer of clothes and slumping into a new position each time, until he was down to pants and one shirt and curled up in a tight, protected little ball under the blanket.

Made me think about my own childhood. 

My dad's ex-military, complete with crew cut and authoritarian attitude, my mom subservient to his every whim. Two older brothers, a brain and a jock, everything a parent could want. My family was like something out of the fifties. Fucking models for Norman Rockwell. 

Then there was me. All the good roles were taken by the time I dropped into the picture, so I had to settle for being the fuck up. A smart ass from the time I could talk, I got more than my share of the belt. Adolescence didn't improve the situation. Bulked up with the weight, grew my hair long, retreated further into my own world of comics, movies and electronic gadgets. None of which ingratiated me.

But once in a while, I got sick. Chicken pox, mumps, flu, sore throat. Mom slowed down and paid attention to me, plied me with soup and ginger ale. Dad gone to work, my brothers gone to school, those were the few times I'd have her all to myself. I'd wake up feverish and she'd be sitting right there, maybe reading through one of my comics and smiling to herself. Watching over me.

Like I said, it seemed like the thing to do.

Jay seems much better today. Got up this morning with his mouth going ninety to nothing, took a hot shower, changed into clothes he'd been carrying in a plastic bag in his coat. He ate nearly a whole box of cereal, five pieces of toast and a banana. Even I don't eat that much at one sitting. Fuck, I don't mind. He's fourteen, a growing boy, and half starved. Next trip to the grocery store'll just have to be a big one.

After breakfast, we came to work. Been here a while, me roosting between the QuickStop and RST Video and smoking while Jay circles and dances and generally maintains nonstop movement. Sales are good, some people showing up looking only for us. This being Saturday, with word of mouth obviously bringing us business, we may have his $500 by the end of the day. For some reason that doesn't make me smile.

I figure he'll be long gone the minute we pay Tony.

"Hey lunchbox," Jay breaks into my thoughts, bouncing up to me. Why the fuck does he call me that? "I gotta take a piss. I'll be right back." I split my focus between him and the parking lot, watch while he makes his way through the QuickStop. Stuffing his pockets, waiting until the clerk is engaged in a heated debate with a customer and then unwrapping and gulping down two packages of Twinkies straight off the shelf. Shit. I have to laugh.

Just the kind of skill it takes to keep hunger pains at bay when you've got zero money and too much pride to beg or take handouts.

After making the requisite pitstop in the men's room, he comes back smiling, holding out a pack of gum. "Here you go, tubby, a little present." I lift an eyebrow, Catholic morals pounded into me since birth demanding that I at least pretend to disapprove. But Jay looks so stricken that I abandon the effort and take the pilfered gift, putting pieces into my mouth until the wrinkle in his brow smoothes out. God I'm a sucker.

Then he's off again, shifting from foot to foot, peeking through the video store window and holding forth with unflattering commentary about the people inside. He cups his hands, breathes into them, warming his fingers. I remember the gloves and hat that I shoved into his coat pockets weeks ago. I wonder aloud what happened to them. The question earns me a nasty glare.

"Yeah, about that, tubby." Jay growls, frowning. I've tapped a nerve. "Two fucking things." He holds up as many fingers. "One, I don't take fucking charity. The clothes, the coat, you got too fat for 'em, that's fine. Ain't worth nothing to you anymore anyways. But you don't fucking outgrow gloves and hats." 

He pauses, stares at me. Finally, I nod and he goes on. "Two, no sneaky shit. You want to give me something, do something nice for me, you do it up front, not behind my fucking back. Got it?" I nod again.

Point taken.

But I have to ask him again where the items went. He sighs. "I gave 'em away. I ain't the only fucking kid on the street, you know." And he blushes. He's embarrassed! 

Keeps his distance after that admission, only landing next to me when a customer approaches and even then he avoids my eyes. His discomfort is tangible. Perhaps he thinks he's shown me a defect. Or worse yet, revealed that he has a heart. I don't fault him his unease. Just what he doesn't need out on the street, a heart to get trampled on or used to someone else's advantage.

I don't much care for having one myself. Makes life painful. It's why I stopped talking, stopped interacting with people. I can't seem to harden it enough to withstand human contact. Which is why I should be glad I'm almost done with this kid, right?

Navel gazing about all this, I momentarily forget my purpose in our partnership, don't notice the danger until it's imminent in the form of a very muscular, very intense predator looming over Jay. They're at least a couple of yards away from me. Fuck. Two more assholes are coming up behind me. I ignore my own predicament and walk toward Jay.

Terror crosses his face as the guy grabs him. He hides it quickly under the same bluster he used in confronting me that first night. "What the fuck you want, you big ugly motherfucker? A piece of my sweet ass? Ain't for sale. Ain't that right, Silent Bob?" He doesn't turn to me, eyes trained instead on the blockhead in front of him. He's taking everything in, looking for weapons, weaknesses, opportunities for escape.

Maybe he should be the muscle instead of me.

I look away from him long enough to check out the other two imbeciles, pleased to find that while we're outnumbered, only one of them seems to pose a real threat. Unfortunately, he's the one clenching Jay's arm. One twist and he could snap it like a twig. I restrain myself. Not gonna move if it means Jay gets hurt.

"I wouldn't touch your nappy ass if you was giving it away." the big fucker sneers, moving, pushing Jay toward the side of the building. Gritting my teeth, my escorts and I follow until we're all out of plain sight. Not good.

"You better tell me what the fuck you want and let me the fuck go, you dickless piece of shit." Jay snarls, trying to pull away, more wired by the second. Slow down, Jay, don't push it . . . 

"Listen, you didn't bring us around here for a dance." I say, drawing attention my way. "The faster you tell us what you want, the faster we get this transaction over with." Non descript fellows, all of them, no gang colors, white, probably somewhere around my age, maybe a little older. My two look bored as hell but alert.

The big guy, though, he's pissed. He gathers up a handful of Jay's coat and shoves him into the wall, leans into him. Jay freezes and I jump but the goon's friends grab me and I don't resist. Not yet. Not yet. Not yet. Bide your time, Bob, wait for the right moment.

"I'm gonna talk and you're gonna listen, Goldilocks." the one in charge says, addressing Jay but looking at me. "This is my turf. Mine. I sell here. You wanna keep breathing, you two fucks will vacate. As long as you make it quick, I won't hold a grudge. Understand?" He cocks his head at me. I notice his hand. He's relaxing his grip on Jay, just barely. Jay catches my eye and winks.

Action. Jay slams his knee into the guy's crotch, eliciting a spectacular, breathless scream, and head butts him a split second later. I duck and throw my elbows backward, make contact with flesh, throw some punches, kick and stomp at whatever falls down, and spin back around in time to see a meaty fist collide with Jay's face.

Adrenaline rush that surges through me in that moment is like nothing I've felt before, blinding, deafening, all consuming . . . asshole's on one knee already, the hand he's not using on Jay buried between his legs, and I launch myself at him, pound on him with a ferocity that would shock me if I weren't in the middle of it.

That's probably what's driving them away, his friends, I can hear them running, footfalls fading quickly. A voice I don't recognize - "What the hell's going on out here!?" - yanks me out of the frenzy and I let go of the fucker, infinitely satisfied when he scrambles away as fast as the others, albeit limping and bleeding.

"Those fuckers were trying to mug me and Silent Bob!" Jay's yelling. "Fucking pricks! What kind of business you running here, you fucking clerk, what kind of neighborhood is this, felons fucking running around, ain't safe to shop here, somebody should fucking - " and so on.

Leaning over, panting, I let him ramble. Fuck, something's definitely changed since that alleyway, since the last time I saw somebody trying to make this kid eat the asphalt. I cared then, and I stepped in. But this. Fuck. I feel . . . paternal. Protective to the point of homicide. Fuck. 

Finally able to breathe again, I push myself upright. "It's ok, it's ok, it's over." I interrupt Jay's tirade. Guy from the video store's the one listening to him rant, lean, plaid shirt, backwards baseball cap, giving him a dubious once over. Jay isn't looking at him, though, despite all the trash talk. He's staring at me, actually, looking worried. Worried? Is that what I see on on his face?

"You ok, Silent Bob? You alright, man?" He steps over to me, puts a hand on my shoulder. Up close now, I realize he's bleeding from his nose and maybe his mouth, a cut open on his forehead.

"I'm fine." I insist. "But you're not." When I reach toward him, he flinches, hard, and I remember who I'm dealing with and back off. He lifts his fingers to his upper lip, scowls at them when they come away bloody. 

"Fucking bastards." he says. Clerk's still watching us both with one eyebrow arched. He offers to call the cops, smirks knowingly when I decline with a shake of my head, and goes back to his lazy ass job. Suppose he's noticed our thriving trade. Whatever. 

Now that we're alone, Jay calms a little, leans against the wall, and I join him. "Fuck, you kicked their fucking asses, Silent Bob." Smiles at me. "You really fucked 'em up, did you see them running, fucking chickens, took off like their asses was on fire. Even that fucking King Kong asshole. You fucking took him down." I shake my head.

"No, that was you, Jay." I light up a couple of cigarettes and pass one to him. "He was already on the ground by the time I got to him, I just cleaned up the mess. I have to say, I'm fucking impressed. Nice moves." Jay ducks his head, almost shy.

"Yeah, well." He drags on the cigarette. "I got a few. Some of 'em hurt me as much as the prick I use 'em on." He fusses with the cut on his forehead. "Guy had a head like a fucking rock . . . "

"You might need stitches to close that up." I observe, not shocked by the sharp laugh I get in answer.

"This ain't nothing." He looks away, swallows hard, wind lifting a few strands of his long hair. "I been through a lot worse than this shit." The ensuing silence tugs at me but I don't speak. Whatever memories are surfacing, they're obviously painful. He pushes them away visibly with a shake of his head and forces a tired grin. "Kinda surprised you hung around, Silent Bob."

"What?" This is one of those moments when every shitty thing that's been done to him shows up on his face and he ages a few years. "You expected me to bolt?" He nods, finishing up the cigarette and grinding it under his heel.

"Sure. Why wouldn't you? Everybody else does."

"Not me." I tell him firmly. "We had an agreement. You sell the stuff, I hold the money and get your back." Looks away again and starts using his shirt sleeve to wipe his bloody nose.

"People agree to a lot of things." he says, still avoiding my gaze. "Don't mean they do 'em. I learned a long fucking time ago not to count on people doing what they say. All the fucking trick moves in the world ain't worth nothing till you get that one through your head."

"I respect that." He snorts. "I do. I get it." Finally he looks at me, eyes narrow, examining my face for something to prove or disprove my words. "But I want you to be clear. I mean what I say." I pause, contemplate the irony of my statement, and laugh. "Or don't say, as the case may be."

Breaks the tension and Jay laughs too. Don't know if the message has sunk in, but if not, that's ok. Takes time. If he wants to invest any, I'm here, can't deny that anymore, certainly not to myself. Maybe he understands at least that much.


	7. Seven

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

SEVEN

Do you know how many times I've had my ass kicked while somebody watched and didn't lift a fucking finger to help me? People that should have? Like my own fucking mom?

Never had anybody, _anybody_, stick up for me like Silent Bob did yesterday. Couldn't fucking believe it. That ugly fucker grabbed me, squeezed my arm hard enough to cut off the feeling in my hand, and I wondered how long it'd take for Silent Bob to skip out. Then I saw him from the corner of my eye, crazy ass fool, edging up beside me.

And when the shit hit the fan, he went fucking nuts, raging on that fucker's ass. I seen enough of Silent Bob by now to know that ain't like him, going off that way, but it didn't scare me. He was doing that shit for me. For me. He didn't get fired up that way until that big fucker hit me. 

Fucking crazy, crazy shit.

Maybe Silent Bob's for real. Sure as hell keeps acting like it.

We didn't hang around the QuickStop after that, Silent Bob thought we ought to go home. It was afternoon already anyways. I let him doctor my face, clean the cuts and put on bandaids. He was real gentle, too. Been a while since I let somebody touch me like that. Years, I guess.

That bitch, Angela, spent a week in her crib, and we fucked and all, but I didn't let her touch my face. I don't like people touching my fucking face, not since I was eight years old and I woke up in the middle of the fucking night with my mom's boyfriend shoving his dick in my mouth. I put up a fight and he beat the shit out of me. He had a big fucking ring on one finger and it ripped my lip up pretty bad. Twenty eight stitches in the emergency room.

It ain't my fondest memory, I'll tell you that. I don't think I've let anybody touch my face since. Till yesterday.

Silent Bob cooked dinner then, chicken soup and sandwiches and I ate until I couldn't move, my ass parked in the floor in front of the coffee table, watching television. He let me have the remote too. 

Then we talked about the weed and the money. Decided to roll some of the shit we had left, make a little more cash that way, get my debt paid off sooner. Silent Bob said he'd have to make some collections before too long and meet with Tony, and he'd need to have the dough by then.

We didn't talk about afterwards. About me leaving. Fuck if I wasn't sitting there wanting to ask him if I could stay for awhile, after we finish up our business. Way he defended me, maybe he woulda even said yes. But I could never ask for something like that.

Maybe I'm more scared of him saying yes than I am of him saying no. What the fuck would that be like, to have a real friend? Somebody to talk to. Somebody who really listens. Somebody who gives a shit about me.

You might not believe it, but I ain't never had that. Not ever. Not even when I was little, before my dad left. He was too busy getting high to even call me in out of the fucking rain. My mom too. Half the time they didn't even bother to feed me, much less have a fucking conversation.

Fuck all of that. Just fuck it. Why the fuck do I gotta think about that shit? So fucking long ago, don't matter anymore. Gotta keep my mind on today. On making this fucking money so I can get my ass out of hock with that fucking drug dealer.

I look over at Silent Bob. We've been standing out in front of his QuickStop since eight o'clock this morning. It's coming up on noon. He's looking fierce today, watching everybody real close, and he don't like it when I get more than a few steps away from him. Gives me a real stern face and points to the pavement beside him so I know where it is I'm supposed to be. S'funny.

We ain't sold much. Maybe cause it's Sunday and people don't wanna do anything to piss God off on a Sunday. Yesterday that woulda bothered me. Today I'm thinking the longer it takes us to make this $500 bucks, the better, long as it don't make trouble for Silent Bob. Puts off that shitty feeling I'm gonna have when I gotta pack up my shit and take off.

Silent Bob puts out his cigarette and glances around, gestures toward the QuickStop. "What, you wanna go inside?" I ask. He nods. "You gotta take a piss or something?" Nods again. "Well fine, then go ahead." He lifts an eyebrow at me, real serious, like he's scolding me. "I ain't going with you, you gay fuck. I like you, Silent Bob, but not that much." He rolls his eyes.

"You don't have to go into the john with me, asshole. Just wait inside the store till I'm done. You'll be safer in there."

"Safer? You think those fucks would mess with me again after what you did to 'em yesterday? Fuck no." But he ain't listening to me. He takes my arm, real careful, like he's handling something breakable, and I let him lead me through the door.

Walk around the store while he does his thing in the bathroom, checking out the security mirror. That fucking clerk is watching me. He's here every fucking day and he ain't stupid, he knows I'm lifting anything that ain't nailed down. He whines alot, bitching and moaning to anybody who'll listen. Like he's got it so bad. Got a job don't he? Place to live. Food to eat. Nice clothes. Fuck him.

What the fuck is taking so long? Lunchbox must be taking a dump, probably be in there a half an hour, meanwhile I'm stuck out here with that clerk staring me down. I wander up to the front of the store and start flipping through the magazines. All the porn's behind the counter. Fuck. Can't even find a decent comic, this gyp joint ain't got nothing but tabloids and newspapers and fucking Good Housekeeping.

Girl comes in, lots of dark, curly hair and red lipstick, short skirt. Nice. She smiles at me while she's buying a pack of cigarettes. My cock stands up and takes notice. I follow her when she heads outside, want to see where she's going, watch her ass shake a little longer.

"Hey baby, maybe I'll see you around sometime, huh?" I say, watching her get into the only car in the parking lot. She laughs but she don't flip me off or nothing when she drives away. Yeah, she was hot. I'd like to get me some of that.

I turn around to go back inside the store and realize I've just made about the biggest fucking mistake of my life, cause I'm staring right into the chest of the same fucking moron that smashed me in the face yesterday. He sucker punches me, right in the gut, hard enough I can't scream or fight while he shoves me around the side of the building. 

One of his friends is waiting for us, grabs my hands and pulls 'em behind my back. The other one must be around front somewheres, watching for Silent Bob. Oh fuck, I'm in trouble. Big trouble.

By now I'm getting my breath back. I try to get my knee up or get my hands free, but he's pushing himself against me, trapping me between him and his fucking flunkie like the meat in a fucking gay sandwich and I can't hardly move. He clamps his hand over my mouth.

"I warned you, Goldilocks." Next thing I feel is something cold in my belly, like he's shoved an icicle inside me, and then something warm running down the front of me, down my pants leg. Did I piss myself? And then it hurts, so fucking bad, and I know the warmth ain't piss, it's blood. Fucker just stabbed me.

Oh fuck, Silent Bob, please come outside, please . . .

Try again, try again, gotta get loose, and I struggle, kick and thrash as hard as I can, bring my boot down on his foot, but it don't make any difference and I feel that cold piece of metal go in again, a little higher this time. 

I hear something then, something that don't seem quite human, and over this fucking bastard's shoulder I see Silent Bob, even more pissed than he was yesterday. That wild ass sound is coming out of _him_. He throws his arm around the guy's throat and yanks, hard, pulling him off of me. 

When the fucker's hand leaves my mouth, I scream, heave myself backwards with everything I got, knocking the other asshole into the wall. There's a loud crack when his head hits the concrete blocks but he don't fall. He shakes it off and runs.

Back up against the wall cause I'm about to fall myself, press both hands against the burning, stinging wounds in my side, blood pumping out between my fingers. Silent Bob's tangled up with that motherfucker, the two of 'em rolling around on the ground, and I can see the knife now, still in his hand, switchblade, dripping red.

Fuck, I gotta do something or he's gonna stick Silent Bob . . . I take a couple steps forward and kick his hand, knife goes clattering away, far enough that Silent Bob's got a chance to finish this shit in one piece. Stumble back to the wall again, slide down till my ass is on the ground and my knees are up under my chin. Oh God it fucking hurts . . . 

"Holy shit!" QuickStop clerk is standing there now, his eyes bugging out and his mouth hanging open. He looks at Silent Bob and that asshole wrestling, looks at me bleeding. "Shit! 911! 911!" He yells it like the cops'll hear him from across town and come running. Then he's gone.

Without his blade, the big cocksucker ain't interested in fighting anymore and the first chance he gets, he pushes Silent Bob off of him, disappears over the fence in back of the building. Silent Bob stands up, dazed, moves toward me.

"Oh fuck . . . " He rushes over and kneels in front of me, staring not at my face but down, probably looking at the blood. He swallows real hard and meets my eyes. "Oh my God, Jay . . . he stabbed you." I ain't looked down yet and I start to but he shakes his head. "No, don't . . . "

Pain's so bad, burning, burning like fucking fire spreading through my gut, and my legs are shaking. Still bleeding but my arms are shaking too and I can't keep my hands over the wounds. "Sorry Bob sorry . . . " My hands slip. Silent Bob sees them fall and shoves his own hand in there against my side.

"Sorry for what?" he hisses, like maybe he's mad. 

  
"Shoulda listened . . . " I whisper back, breath catching in my chest. "Shoulda stayed inside . . . like you said . . . shoulda listened . . . "

"Yeah, you should have, but I won't hold it against you." Looks like he might cry. "It's gonna be ok, Jay, you'll be alright. Just hold on." He turns toward the wail of a siren. "You hear that?" I'd turn my head too but I can't. Can't do much of anything but sit here, trying to breathe through the pain.

Paramedics take over then, putting a mask over my face, poking needles in anywhere I've got skin showing, cutting my clothes off, asking me questions. I try to answer but I can only get out one word at a time and even then it's so fucking quiet I don't know if they hear me. 

Silent Bob's standing close by, watching, looks scared. Medic grabs his hand and I realize some of the blood on it is his. Motherfucker slashed his hand open. Got himself stuck trying to protect me.

They load me up in the ambulance and take off. It's hard to breathe, hard to see, hard to think, only thing makes sense is the pain. Fucking ambulance bounces like a roller coaster. Paramedic, a lady, hanging over me, talking but I don't know what she's saying, brushing my hair away from my face. Oh fuck it hurts, never felt pain so bad in my whole fucking life. 

Eyes slip shut . . . I force 'em back open. No sleep, can't sleep, cause I'm afraid I won't ever wake up again. Oh God it hurts . . . 

Feel pressure on my hand and I think they're gonna prick me again, but when I look over I see Silent Bob's holding it in his good one. He's riding with me. Don't look like he's gonna cry anymore, he is. Got tears running from my eyes too.

Spend all my energy, all my brains, all my strength trying to stay alive on the street, avoiding what danger I can, hiding, scrounging for food, working so fucking hard to stay alive.

Hurts so bad . . . can't breathe.

Not like this . . . not supposed to be like this . . . not like this.

Mask comes off my face and suddenly there's hands jerking my head back, fingers prying my mouth open, something metal being shoved between my teeth, down my throat. If I could fight I would. Eyes roll up in my head. Fucking thing stings my throat. Then it's gone and the mask comes back and there's air again, pushing into me.

It ain't me breathing now, it's them, doing it for me. Oh God it hurts . . . 

Can't keep my eyes open anymore. Everything's gray, like an old TV when you turn it off, the picture fading, sliding off the screen till there's nothing.


	8. Eight

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

EIGHT

Fucking john in this place is hideous. Light bulb flickering like it's trying to go out, sink backed up and full of filthy water, ribbons of toilet paper festooning every surface, badly drawn sex cartoons and misspelled graffiti all over the walls, and a stench that makes my eyes water. Hope the toilet flushes.

I hold my breath and hurry, and not just because of the glorious environment. Not too thrilled about leaving Jay out there to his own questionable devices, considering what happened yesterday. I know they wouldn't fuck with him inside the store, but with his limited attention span, I figure it won't be long before he wanders back out.

Probably just paranoid, but I'd hate like hell for him to end up with any more bruises while he's under my roof.

Take the time to wash my hands, trying not to overflow the fucking sink. Maybe I should say something to the clerk. No. He knows. And if he's anything like I was when I had the misfortune of working here, he doesn't care anyway.

Almost out of cigarettes, maybe I'll buy a pack on my way out. I scan the store on my way to the counter but Jay's nowhere to be seen. Look outside and take uneasy inventory of an empty parking lot, an empty sidewalk. My stomach drops into my shoes.

Can't stop myself breaking into a run, and I clip a display with my shoulder before I hit the door, bags of chips flying and the clerk cursing me.

I round the corner of the building and fuck if they aren't there in the same exact spot we were in yesterday, the big guy and just one of the others. They've got Jay pressed tight between them, the goon at his back and the big fucker at his chest. Asshole looks like he's whispering sweet nothings, his head obscuring Jay's face, his mouth nearly touching Jay's ear.

Jay's leg is twitching and there's something odd about the movement, something not right. And then I see what can only be blood, a bright red stain spreading down the front of Jay's pants.

Next thing I know the bastard and I are on the ground and I'm sitting on his stomach, one hand at his throat, fighting him to get the other one up there so I can fucking throttle him, fucking bastard, fucking asshole, he's gonna wish he'd never even seen Jay when I get through with him, if I don't fucking kill him this time, and I might, I just fucking might . . . fuck, my left hand is suddenly stinging, sizzling with pain . . . 

Distracts me and the fucker upends me, rolls over and starts trying to wrestle me flat to the pavement. A flash catches my eye. Holy fuck, he's got a knife . . . as soon as I realize that's what it is, I see Jay stumbling toward us, bloody and pale. He kicks the asshole's hand and the knife skids ten feet across the pavement, into a pile of garbage.

I climb then, on top of and over the bastard, shove my knee into his throat, thoughts of killing him on hold for the moment, my only priority to subdue him and get to Jay. Because Jay is . . . Jay is . . . I don't want to acknowledge it. 

He's on the ground, is what he is, sitting in a puddle of blood, knees drawn up, hands clutched to his side. Have to fucking get to him. Have to fucking do something.

Hear a voice shouting from somewhere and I realize somebody's calling the cops. Thank God, at least there's help coming.

Fucker slips away from me then, and runs. I don't turn to see where he's gone, shaking off the pain that's still singeing my hand, kneeling down in front of Jay, staring at his side, his hands, the blood that seems to be pouring out of him so fucking fast. I force myself to meet his eyes.

"Oh my God, Jay . . . he stabbed you." I don't know why I say it, words falling dumbly out of my mouth. Shaking violently, his breath coming too quick, he starts to look down. "No, don't." I'm afraid he'll lose it if he gets a look at all the blood. So much fucking blood.

"Sorry Bob sorry . . . " he says out of nowhere, and his hands suddenly fall away from his side. I jump, replace them with my own hand, trying to maintain some kind of pressure against the wound, for all the good it seems to be doing.

"Sorry for what?" I say. My heart shatters into a thousand pieces when he answers me.

"Shoulda listened . . . " he whispers. "Shoulda stayed inside . . . like you said . . . shoulda listened . . . " If I weren't two inches from his face, I wouldn't have heard him.

"Yeah, you should have, but I won't hold it against you." I swallow hard against the lump in my throat, sniff back a rush of tears. Blood keeps slipping out past my hand, so hot and so much of it. I try to focus on his face, his teeth chattering just a little. "It's gonna be ok, Jay, you'll be alright. Just hold on."

Siren grabs my attention and I jerk toward the sound. "You hear that?" I say, turning back to him, but he doesn't reply, panting, his eyes narrowed in obvious pain. Fuck them, where are they? The siren gets louder and finally there's an ambulance shrieking at the mouth of the alley, paramedics tumbling out.

They shove me aside but I hover as close as I can, blinking at the red and white lights bouncing off the bricks and trying to see what the fuck they're doing to him. Somebody's asking me questions and I rattle out one word answers until there's a sentence I don't understand.

"Sir, you're injured, let me have a look." They tug at my left hand, the one that's stinging, and I glance at it for the first time. There's a slash through it, lengthwise, from between my first and middle fingers all the way down to my wrist, blood spurting out of the cut at a rate that surprises me. Still, it's nothing compared to what's happened to Jay and I turn back to him while the medic tends to me.

Perhaps because of my own injury, they allow me to ride in the ambulance, and I'm grateful, relieved to be near him. They've got him wired and IV'd and masked, tucked onto a stretcher. He's still conscious but he looks delirious, eyes rolling, his head moving side to side. 

His hand is right there within reach, trembling. I grab it and he looks at me. He starts to cry and I realize I'm already doing it, tears on my cheeks, choking back sobs.

Suddenly one of the paramedics is on top of him and I can't see why, can't see what's happened, until the ambulance takes a clumsy turn and everyone sways to the right. There's a tube down his throat now, bloody bubbles at the corner of his mouth, and they're squeezing air into his lungs with a bag.

Oh God. Please. Please. He's a kid. He's fourteen fucking years old. 

One of the medics takes Jay's hand from mine and I feel a surge of insane anger at the loss of it. I touch his leg then, trying to maintain some kind of physical contact even though I can see that he's lost consciousness, unmoving, his eyes closed.

Ambulance stops and the doors fly open, winter wind whipping inside and pushing at the corner of the gray, blood soaked blanket that covers his legs. They pull the stretcher outside, pop the wheels to the ground and roll him toward the hospital.

One handed and slightly dizzy, I make my own way out of the ambulance. He's gone. They've carried him off somewhere behind closed doors, somewhere I can't follow. A medic drags me through the emergency room and into a cubicle where they pull me out of my trench and my shirt and cover me with an ill fitting gown. 

Doctors, nurses and assorted hospital personnel rotate around me as they work on my hand and I ask everyone who gets within earshot if they can tell me anything about Jay. They brush me off but I don't stop. I'm babbling. Silent fucking Bob is babbling.

Nurse is injecting something into my arm. Goddamn her. No good to him now, if I ever was, half stoned on whatever they've given me. Can't seem to wrap my mouth around words anymore, so the babbling subsides.

Oh fuck. Uniforms. Police. Walking toward me, frowning, two of them. Suppose they've got questions. I remember I can't talk and a giddy laugh escapes me. Convenient disability. One of them gets in my face, harassing me, scowling, waving something. I follow with my eyes until the blur solidifies.

Ziploc bag half full of neatly rolled joints, except some of them aren't so neat anymore, bissected, weed scattered, near a puncture in the bag, which is now covered with Jay's blood.

Black hole opens up in my gut, threatening to swallow me from inside out, and I burst into uncontrolled, hysterical tears. He looks horrified, this cop, embarrassed and maybe sorry.

Oh Christ this is so bad. So so bad. I think I'm gonna throw up. No. No I won't. 

Oh God Jay I'm sorry, I'm so fucking sorry I wasn't there, I'm so sorry I let this happen to you. What kind of fucking idiot am I? He's fourteen fucking years old, he's a goddamned kid, and I put him out in front of the fucking QuickStop to sell drugs? I got his ass kicked? I got him stabbed?

"I just wanted to fucking help him . . . " I sob, but it comes out as so much nonsense. I'm not talking to the cop, who's still leaning down in front of me, but to myself. Fucking help him. Probably helped him right into a pine box.

Cops leave. Doctor sews my palm back together. I sit here crying like a fucking baby, wallowing in guilt, wishing it was me bleeding to death and not him. Not Jay. Fourteen fucking years old, bruised and hungry but as tough as fucking nails, surviving just fine on his own, just beginning to trust me and FUCK ME, I wasn't there.

I wasn't fucking there.

Finally the tears run out, just as they finish stitching me up. Fuck I'm tired. Nurse wraps my hand in bandages and hangs my arm in a sling, mumbles something about blood loss and letting me sleep.

Hours pass. I know this only because there's a clock within sight. Lie here in an uneasy state of semi-consciousness, not really asleep but not really awake, thoughts never far from Jay and what's happened to him. Worrying. Afraid he's dead. Would anyone tell me if he was?


	9. Nine

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

NINE

Been sitting here for two days and I swear, I cannot think of one more fucking thing to say. I'm talked out. Quite the switch, don't you think, Silent fucking Bob talking for two days straight, while Jay, who hardly shuts his mouth even in sleep, lays here absolutely speechless.

Not that he has much choice. Hard to talk when you're unconscious, harder still when you've got a tube jammed down your throat.

It's hard to tolerate. Hard to sit here hour after fucking hour, watching his chest rise and fall with measured precision as the respirator pushes breath into his lungs. Click. Whoosh. Click. Whoosh. Pair that with the sound of the cardiac monitor over the bed, tracing the peaks and valleys of his heartbeat. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Enough to give anybody a fucking headache after awhile.

Well, that symphony combined with a thousand other things. My muscles drawn tight, my body forced into unnatural contortions courtesy of this avocado green molded plastic chair. My stomach tied in knots, empty except for the occasional cup of gritty, lukewarm coffee offered by a nurse. My eyes stinging from lack of sleep and the accumulation of countless unshed tears.

My left hand, throbbing with pain and itching under the bandages, cradled useless against my chest. My right hand shoved through the bedrail and wrapped around one of Jay's, cold and motionless and so fucking pale, a bruise forming around the IV needle piercing it. My throat sore, because I've spent 48 hours forcing words around a lump that won't go away. 

I keep telling him to hang on, that I'm here, that I'm watching his back, that he's safe and that I won't let anyone hurt him. I keep telling him that he's gonna be ok. That _everything's _gonna be ok. As if saying it, over and over and over again, will make it happen. As if I have some kind of supernatural control over the outcome of this hideous, horrible fucking situation.

My brain goes to buzzing sometimes. With guilt for my role in all of this, same guilt as I felt staring at that bloody bag of joints, only more focused now with the absence of medication. Guilt for taking this fourteen year old kid and putting him on someone else's turf to sell weed, naive fuck that I am, thinking the worst that could happen would be a little pushing and shoving, a few punches thrown.

Buzzes with rage too. I picture that fucker sometimes, with photographic clarity, his mouth against the boy's ear in that split second before I saw the blood spreading down the front of those faded, tattered jeans, and I fantasize about slitting his fucking throat.

Always come back to the present, though, to the pain I'd like to avoid. To Jay and the condition he's in right now. Barely alive.

Coming down off the pain killers that first day, someone came to me, found me a clean shirt, and led me up here to the third floor where they were still operating on him. Against hospital policy but they filled me in on all the details when I begged. 

Eight hours of surgery, give or take, when they were done. So much blood lost, so much damage done to so many organs. So few guarantees. Maybe that's why they told me. Maybe that's why they didn't put up a fight when I insisted on coming in here. Maybe that's why they've let me sit here, almost constantly, for two days, despite the inevitable rules about visiting hours.

Suspicious character, I know that's what some of them thought, showing up here with their fragile patient under such questionable circumstances. Could be his pimp, or maybe his sugar daddy. At best, I'm his partner in crime, and that's contemptible enough, right? Should know better, even if I'm only five years his senior. I believe the charge is "corruption of a minor".

But after two days, the looks on their faces have softened. They've watched me in here, holding his hand, talking to him, foregoing food and sleep. Maybe they think it's noble. What they don't realize is that I have no choice in the matter.

I don't know when that happened. Could have been any number of moments. Tripping over his outstretched leg on the sidewalk and pulling my fist back to smack him in the mouth for the inconvenience. Seeing him struggle in that alleyway, mouth sealed shut and knuckles scraping the asphalt. Watching his fevered sleep on my couch. Feeling red hot rage flood through me when that fucker's fist met with his face.

No. No. I know the exact moment I committed myself to this, even if I wasn't aware of it at the time. Committed myself to watching over him. To doing whatever the fuck I could to help him, to protect him, for as long as he would tolerate.

It was after the scuffle, back at my place, and Jay was peering into the mirror over the bathroom sink, examining the cut on his forehead and wincing. I offered to clean and dress it for him. Nerves frayed by the fight, wary and agitated, he finally nodded and sat down on the edge of the tub. So much shit playing out across his tired face, sitting there, fear and pain and a dozen other unreadable emotions. I started washing out the cut, warning him each time I went to touch him, blowing on it to take away the sting.

He shuddered then, looking up at me, tears filling his eyes, and the awful thought crossed my mind that this might be the gentlest anyone had ever been with him. Ever. He trembled for a few seconds and then he relaxed, to the point I thought he might slump over and fall into the bathtub.

Yeah, that was the moment.

The memory chokes me and I stare at him. 

He's so fucking young and so alone. Scarred. A jagged tear in his upper lip, a small crescent carved out over his eyebrow, a clean, straight line down his forearm, details hidden before because the kid was in perpetual motion, a blur of gangly, graceful limbs and long golden hair.

He's survived God only knows how many abuses and betrayals and abandonments to get to this point. Fourteen years old and about as strong and stubborn a person as I've ever met, streetwise, quick on his feet. Funny and shrewd and resourceful.

No parents. No brothers and sisters. No distant relations. No one has shown up these last two days and I've given up hope that anyone will because I know the hospital has already made all the requisite calls to the authorities. I knew in my gut, if not in point of fact, that there was no one.

It breaks my heart all the same, knowing that I'm it. That I'm all he has. Because he deserves more.

I lean in for the millionth time, rest my shoulder against the bed rail and brush my thumb across his fingers. I find my voice. Remind him yet again that I'm here, that he's safe and that I won't let anyone hurt him. Ask him to hang on. Tell him if he's got nothing else, he's got me, what little comfort that might be.

I tell him that I won't leave him.

His hand twitches. I gasp. He's been motionless for two days. Completely motionless. Could this be a muscle spasm or a reflex? Or can he hear me? Is he beginning to come out of this half dead, comatose state?

"Jay?" I whisper. "Jay, can you hear me?" Again. His fingers tense and then relax in my hand. The movement is subtle but clear. I stare at him, waiting for more. There's nothing new. Eyes closed, lips taped mostly shut around the respirator tube jammed between his teeth. Hospital sheet crisp and smooth and perfect across his chest in the exact same position it's been since the nurses last folded it down.

Again. Those long, slender fingers squeeze mine with more urgency, more pressure this time, before they go slack. I glance around me, with an odd feeling that if I alert anyone else to what he's doing, he'll stop and I'll look like an idiot.

"Shit, Jay, you _can_ hear me, can't you?" I ask again, incredulous, as if he hasn't already answered.

Then he moves his head. They've had him facing forward, chin tilted slightly upward, perhaps to accommodate the tube down his throat, but he's turning, turning toward me, and tipping his face down. He stops after just a few seconds, maybe an inch or two of movement.

I swear to God, I think my face is going to crack because the smile twisting my lips feels so foreign.

Break my silence, the silence I've tried to keep with everybody but Jay, by hissing at the nearest nurse to come over, that he's moving, that he's squeezing my hand and turning his head and does she think that maybe he's waking up?

It's a few moments before I realize I've got tears running down my cheeks, but I'm not embarrassed. Nothing has ever, ever made me so fucking happy as the feeling of his hand squeezing mine and the sight of his head turning toward the sound of my voice. Because it means he's going to live through this.

Few minutes later I go to the bathroom and I cry, sobbing with relief, and when the tears dry up I collapse on a waiting room couch and let myself sleep because Jay, God bless him, will still be there when I wake up.


	10. Ten

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

TEN

Sometimes it's like I'm dreaming, seeing things I know can't be real. Like my parents, fucking smiling at me. Dad took off when I was still in kindergarten. Mom fucking threw me away years ago. Only time either one of them ever smiled was when they were fucking high, and that had jack shit to do with me. 

Fucking dreams.

Other times it's like I'm blind. I can hear people talking, feel people touching me, touching bare skin on my chest or my stomach or touching my face. I try to open my eyes and I try to move, especially when I feel that shit, because I don't fucking like it and I want to find out who's fucking touching me and make them stop.

But I can't open my eyes and I can't move.

Once in awhile when I'm blind like that and listening to the voices, I find one that's familiar. Silent Bob. I don't really understand most of what he says, but it don't matter. His voice is real soft and warm, a little hoarse, and I can feel his hand holding mine. When he's talking and holding my hand, my brain relaxes and I stop trying to remember what the fuck happened, stop trying to figure out where I am and why I can't wake up.

Nobody's gonna fuck with me while he's here. Knowing that makes me feel something. Calm? Protected? Fuck, maybe this is what it's like to feel safe.

After awhile, the voices start making sense. People calling each other "doctor" and "nurse", talking about things like heart rate and blood pressure and morphine. Hospital. I must be in a hospital. I hate fucking hospitals. All I know about hospitals is pain. 

So little I can't remember exactly what happened except my dad shook me, threw me into a wall. My arm hurts and it's bleeding. I won't stop crying so my mom takes me to the hospital. She don't stay, leaves me with a big lady I don't know. They give me a shot that makes me sleep. When I wake up there's a cast on my arm. My mom's there again, only it's not really her, it's the mom with the glassy eyes that don't hear me when I talk, the mom who forgets to feed me.

Eight years old, face and head all beat to hell by my mom's perverted fucking boyfriend cause I won't swallow his fucking dick. Bloody and dizzy and pissed off and scared, fighting the policeman that's holding a towel against my mouth while we ride through town in a cop car. Laying in an emergency room, crying for my mom even though I know she ain't coming, people holding me down and giving me a shot in my upper lip so they can try to sew it back into one piece. I'm kicking and screaming so there's another shot to knock me out. No mom when I wake up this time, not even the shitty one. No mom ever again.

I don't want to be here. Hospitals are bad.

If I could wake up, I'd run away. If I could move . . . I can move. Can feel the muscles in my arm flexing. I move the other one too. I move my legs. I open my eyes. It's so bright they start to water but I don't want to close them so I squint. Can't see much through the tears, everything's so blurry. I keep moving.

Lots of noises now, beeping, like an alarm clock, and there's people talking, people touching me. Only makes me want to run away more. 

There's that voice again. Silent Bob. "It's ok, Jay, it's ok, calm down, it's alright. I won't let anybody hurt you. It's ok. Relax." He's close. One of those blurry people above me. I blink real hard because I want to see which one is him, but it don't help.

"Please relax, Jay. It's alright. I won't let anybody hurt you." Feel his hand wrapping around mine. Somebody . . . something happened before . . . somebody hurt me and Silent Bob stopped them. Ok. I stop moving and I let them touch me even though I don't like it.

Wave washes over me, and I feel really tired. I close my eyes and sleep.

- - -

The blindness is familiar by now. Noises, but they ain't too loud, quiet little beeps, a clicking sound. No voices. First thing I feel is the hand holding mine and I remember Silent Bob before I remember I'm in a hospital.

It's kinda dark, maybe nighttime, dark enough I can open my eyes without tears. Ceiling's white, no walls, only ugly green curtains hanging from long metal hooks on both sides. Stare awhile, blink, focus. Look to the left. A little screen with jagged lines, seen that kinda thing on TV. That must be my heartbeat. Fuck, that's weird. Watch it for a minute, shooting up, shooting down. Then I have to blink again, focus again, before I can look anywhere else.

Tubes in my nose, IV lines stuck in me, a blood pressure cuff on my left arm. Some fucking plastic thing clipped onto a finger on my left hand. Gotta blink again. Then I try checking out what's on my right.

Oh yeah. Silent Bob. Sitting there holding my fingers, his thumb on the part of my hand that ain't got a needle stuck in it. He's watching me. He looks like shit. Bags under his eyes. No hat covering up his messy hair, no trench coat hiding his wrinkled clothes. One of his arms is in a sling. He smiles at me.

"Hey. You're awake and you're not trying to kick anybody." He raises his eyebrows. I open my mouth to talk but nothing comes out. My throat hurts. Silent Bob lets go my hand, reaches over to a table where there's a plastic pitcher and a cup with a straw in it. He pours some water with his good arm. I take a little sip, wet my lips and my mouth, and another to wet my throat. Makes me cough.

Coughing fucking hurts, even though I don't cough hard. My side, my chest, my stomach, everything fucking hurts, and I'm crying and holding my breath at the same time. Suddenly there's a lady on my left, brown hair, green clothes . . . a nurse. She leans over me, puts her hand against the pain and tells me to keep breathing until it passes.

Once it does, I move my arm to push her off me. I ain't strong enough to do it but she gets the hint and pulls away. My cheeks are wet but I'm too weak to do anything about that either. I look back at Silent Bob. He's holding my hand again and there's tears in his eyes. "Sorry." he says. "Didn't mean to make you cough."

"S'ok." I say. Fuck, my voice is so quiet. I swallow. "Not your fault." He nods. "Hospital." I say.

"Yeah, you're in the hospital." Silent Bob says. Nurse comes around to that side of the bed and I see somebody else walking up, a guy in a white coat, kinda bald, wearing glasses. Doctor. I start shaking a little. I try to keep my eyes on Silent Bob. "I don't know how much you remember, but you were stabbed."

Stabbed? I think about it. Yeah, I remember. Pain. Burning, searing fucking pain. Shaking gets worse. Silent Bob rubs my hand. "You were hurt really badly and you lost alot of blood but you're gonna be ok. Just need to rest. Try to relax."

Stare again at the doctor and the nurse. Can't stop shaking. I hate being fucking scared like this. Can't run away and I can't fight. Being fucking trapped and helpless is way worse than any pain.

"Jay?" Silent Bob says and I look back at him. "It's ok. I won't let anybody hurt you." Still shaking, still scared, even though I believe him. Fuck. My teeth are chattering. I close my eyes. Go away. I want it all to go away, everything except Silent Bob.

Voices mumble to each other. Can feel tears spilling from my eyes and I can't fucking stop shaking. Silent Bob squeezes my fingers. "They're gonna give you something to help you sleep, Jay. Just hold on, ok? It'll be alright."

Few seconds pass and then the drugs hit me. Shaking finally stops. Didn't know my muscles were so tight but I feel the tension now, slipping out of me, right before I fall asleep.

- - -

Silent Bob. Been awake a few days now and the tubby fucker's always here, watching over me. Well, not always. Sometimes he has to go pee, go smoke, go shower, go sleep, go eat. But he always comes back. S'the only thing makes this fucking hospital shit bearable. 

And he ain't so fucking silent lately. When the cops showed up to ask about what happened, he ran interference. When the doctor comes around every day, he asks questions. When they do any kind of test, he's the one who explains everything to me. He don't like talking, but he's doing alot of it. For me.

Sometimes I shake. They told me that was normal, considering everything I been through, my body shaking off some of the drugs and some of the trauma. Trauma. I fucking wanna laugh everytime somebody uses that fucking word. They don't fucking know from trauma.

Don't get me wrong, getting stabbed and nearly bleeding to death is pretty bad, but it ain't the first "trauma" I been through and it sure as shit won't be the last.

I try not to think about it or about the pain that throbs through my chest and my side whenever I'm awake. Just like I try not to think about all the other times I got hurt or fucked or tossed in the fucking garbage. Thinking about that shit don't help. Just makes me shake more, makes me wanna cry.

Sure is hard to forget, though, fucking stuck in this bed, too tired and too weak to move, not enough breath to really talk. Sleep alot. Fucking drugs make sure of that. TV don't really take my mind off of things, either, fucking place gets three channels and one of them's a fucking hospital channel with a bunch of shows about babies and heart attacks and how to eat right.

Laying here watching one of those fucking food shows now, aching as my last dose of drugs wears off. Three other kids in here with me, all of them unconscious, so they don't complain about my choice of programs. It's not a big room but it's big enough that the nurses sitting at their station at one end can't see the TV. Ain't supposed to be watching it anyway, supposed to be watching us. 

Silent Bob went home a while ago, to clean up, get himself a meal. Keep looking toward the door, waiting for him to come back. I'm so busy looking at the door, I don't see the nurse until she's right beside me, makes me jump out of my skin, leaves me breathing hard, my heart thudding.

Fucking intensive care. S'a nice way of saying maximum security. They won't fucking leave you alone, always fucking checking on you. Taking blood, fooling with the oxygen, printing off papers from the heart monitor, measuring how much I been pissing through the fucking tube they've got shoved up my cock.

"Bitch, why you gotta fucking sneak up on me like that?" She just stares at me, scribbles something in my chart.

Ain't the first time she's scared me like that, either, bitch fucking enjoys it. Name's Michelle, got hips as wide as a fucking house and short hair and wears too much fucking makeup. She don't like me. Most of the people here've been real nice and they just ignore me when I flip 'em shit, but this one, her fucking eyes are always hard and cold, same as her hands when she touches me.

"Have some news for you, Jay." she says. Her fucking voice ain't any warmer than the rest of her. "Eight days in the hospital and finally, social services is sending someone down here to process you. Better late than never." Fuck. Ain't my imagination, how happy she is telling me that. Feel the shakes coming on again, starting inside, in my stomach and my chest. Makes the pain worse, makes my teeth rattle against each other.

Fucking social services. Can't even piss for myself yet or get out of fucking bed . . . still too sick to leave intensive fucking care, and already I gotta deal with this shit. Gotta start worrying about what comes next, where they'll put me when I get sprung from this place. Fuck! God fucking damn . . . oh God, now I'm gonna fucking cry in front of this ice queen.

"Not good news?" Michelle says. Now she's smiling. Told you she don't fucking like me. Shivering all over now, arms and legs and hands and guts and everything else I got, not enough control over my body to hold the tears back and my fucking face is burning with shame . . . squeeze my eyes shut tight and try not to sob, try not to fucking humiliate myself anymore than I already have.

"Jay?" Oh Bob . . . Silent fucking Bob . . . keep my eyes shut, blocking out everything except his voice. "Jay, what's wrong?" Talking so soft, worried. "Why is he crying?" Sounds pissed now that he's talking to her. I'd laugh if I wasn't so fucking tired and scared and goddamnit everything fucking hurts . . .

Hand on my arm, warm, patting me. Telling me it's ok. Then he's talking to her again, demanding to know what the hell's going on and did she do something or say something to make me cry, because he's had his eye on her, don't think he hasn't . . . I do laugh now, right in the middle of all this shit, a breathless snort but it feels good, takes the edge off the fucking shivers and breaks the lump in my throat.

Open my eyes again. He's right there, right fucking there, ain't looking at me but at that Michelle bitch, like maybe he wants to clock her. They have a mumbled conversation, short and sharp, but I can't hear the words, and then she stomps over to the nurses' station, slaps my chart down on the counter.

Silent Bob turns back to me, that fucking guard dog look on his face sliding off like a mask, and then his eyebrows go up. A question. _What's wrong? Talk to me, kid._ I sniff. Last few tears dribble down my cheeks. I swallow and look away, concentrate on the cracks in the wall and the feel of him touching my arm. The shakes are starting to fade off. I lift my other hand to wipe my face.

"Fucking social services." I tell the wall. "Somebody's coming to process me. Ask me questions, find out where I been, remind me what an asshole they think I am and what a big favor they're doing me by finding me someplace new to stay."

"Hmmmm." Silent Bob says. Pats my arm again and I listen to the chair dragging along the floor and his ass settling in it. Takes my hand. Doesn't do that so much anymore, the longer I been in here, cause it's kinda embarrassing and sometimes I pull away. Don't pull away now, but I don't look at him either.

"Don't know why it freaked me out so much when she told me." I say. "Been through this shit a million times before."

Silent Bob clears his throat. "Maybe that's why. Because it's the millionth time and you're sick of it. Or maybe it's because you nearly died eight days ago and you're tired and in pain."

Oh fuck him. Tears again. I'm turning into a such a fucking pussy.

"I'll be here, ok?" he says. "When they come to talk to you, I'll be here." Squeezes my hand. Yeah, he'll be here. Won't do any good. He can't call them off of me, can't make them go away. Can't force them to put me someplace where I won't get beat or worked like a slave or fucked up my ass until I get the chance to run away.

Can't do any of that shit.

Something must be fucking wrong with me. Cause even though I know all this, him telling me he's gonna be here makes me feel better. Enough that I don't even need the pain killers to give in and let myself sleep again. Stare at the wall and let the tears dry on my face, let Silent Bob hold my hand, and just go back to sleep.


	11. Eleven

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

ELEVEN

Gave me a bath today. Chick came in, an old chick, coulda been somebody's grandma, pulled the green curtains shut and gave me a sponge bath. Washed my hair too, best she could with me still stuck in this bed. Was kinda whacked, especially when I got a fucking boner in the middle of the whole thing, but she laughed and made a joke about it and it wasn't so bad. 

And my hair's nice and clean and brushed out and looks good. Like I said before, I'm picky about my hair. S'important to me. It's about the only fucking thing I got left anymore.

Thing is, I'm kinda pissed they picked now. Like it's ok I'm all sweaty and funky and my hair's all fucking tangled and greasy against my neck, when it's just me laying here and just Silent Bob hanging around to keep me company. But when social services calls and says they're coming, they break out the soap and make me presentable. I only get to be clean if it's a special fucking occasion, I guess.

Not just cause I'm a human fucking being who might feel better if somebody fucking . . . ah, fuck, who cares. Tired. Fucking tired again. Let out a breath and turn my head on the pillow, look over at Silent Bob, left arm still in a sling across his chest, sleeping sitting up in one of those fucking hospital chairs that make his ass go numb. I seen him scooting around, rubbing his butt with that look on his face. I notice that shit. Don't think I ain't paying attention to shit like that.

Think it's been ten days now, that I've been in this place, and I'm still in intensive care cause half my guts ain't working so good yet. I don't have the energy to run my mouth but ever since they told me fucking social services was gonna come down and fuck with me, I've been running it anyway, trying to drown out the fucking thoughts in my head.

Fucking social services. They ain't all assholes. Some of them've really tried to help me. But they keep fucking it up. Over and over again. Fucking it up bad. Group homes and foster parents and fucking "youth centers", all of them are fucking worse than the street. At least on the street you can fucking run and hide, hit back without getting punished for it.

At least on the street you get paid for the dicks you end up having to suck.

Oh fuck. Oh fucking shit. Blonde bitch walking around in the hallway, right outside the fucking window, grey business suit that don't quite fit her, cheap looking briefcase. Social worker. Fucking social worker's here.

  
"Silent Bob? Silent Bob?" Can't yell at the tubby fucker, I ain't got enough breath, and he ain't moving. Sleepy bitch. Supposed to be here. "Be here" don't mean snoring while he slobbers onto his fucking shirt. "Silent fucking Bob!" Nothing.

Fuck, that bitch is talking to the doctor now, my doctor, glancing in the fucking window and the doc's nodding and shit. God, this fucker is a heavy sleeper. Wish I wasn't such a pussy about all this, wish it didn't scare the shit out of me, but my heart's starting to pound and my stomach's starting to shiver and if Silent Bob would just open his fucking eyes, I could bite my lip and grind my teeth and make it through.

Scan the room out of habit, fight or flight reflex kicking in, looking for exits that ain't there and even if they were, I couldn't walk across the fucking room to use them. Cup. There's a pink plastic cup on the bed tray. Pick it up and throw it at him, little splash of water hits his face and he sits up straight with a curse, swatting the air to defend himself.

"What the hell . . . ?" he's saying, squinting at me, wiping his face with his sleeve. Sees the cup in the floor. "Did you just – "

"Social worker." I interrupt, before he can get in my face. "Fucking social worker's here." Silent Bob glances out the window and gives the bitch a onceover, one eyebrow raised, cautious. Breathe deep now, now that he's on the job again, settle back and lick my lips. My heart comes down outta my throat and the knot in my stomach unwinds some. He picks up the cup and puts it back on the tray.

"I'll be right back." he says, and he joins the doc and the blonde out in the hall. More talk. Silent Bob's between them and the door, stiff, shoulders back. S'right, bitch, you gotta go through Silent Bob to get to me. Then he fucking shakes her hand. Shit. I don't like it but I understand. 

Bitch has more right to be here than he does. He can't keep her out. They'd fucking drag him away if he tried and then I'd be alone again. He's gotta make nice.

But I don't.

"Jay?" Silent Bob's the one coming in first, but it's her talking. She's young, way younger than these broads usually are, and she sounds nervous. Bitch probably just got outta college. Her boss must really hate her fucking guts, sending her out here to cut her teeth on me. "Jay, my name's Julie Campbell."

Right up to the bed now, offering me her hand. I stare at her. Blue eyes, pretty makeup, straight teeth, pearl necklace. Hair's curly, stops at her shoulders. The hand stretched out to me is shaking. Pink fingernails, couple of gold rings with small stones that look real. Not worth much, even at the right pawn shop.

Shit, bitch, I'm sorry, but I still don't like you. You're still one of them.

"Yeah, so?" I say. Stuff my hands under the blankets and shrug, glance away, like maybe I'm bored. Silent Bob comes around to the other side of the bed and touches my shoulder. Ready to get pissy on his fat ass, figure he's trying to tell me to have some manners, but when I look up, he's watching her with fierce eyes.

Relax another few notches into the bed and take some more deep breaths.

"Uh . . . " Julie Campbell says. Her hand hangs next to me another second and then she pulls it back and clutches the top of the briefcase. She says "Uh" a few more times and then goes into the line of shit they all shovel about how she's here to help me.

"Lady, listen." I finally say, stopping her mid sentence. "I don't know what kind of shit they told you about me, maybe you ain't read the file, but there ain't no need to bullshit me cause I been through this all before. You got questions to ask and papers to fill out so let's just get the fuck on with it." 

Her eyes go wide and her mouth pops open. Shit, she really is new to this game. Mary fucking Sunshine. I'm probably the first honest to God street rat she's ever met. Fucking sheltered bitch. For some reason, that pisses me off.

"Quit fucking staring at me, you tight assed bitch, and do your fucking job." Mouth snaps shut. She finds a chair and opens the cheap briefcase, pulls out papers and a pen and starts asking the questions. I keep my answers short. Silent Bob stays on his feet, good hand resting on my shoulder.

Everything's going ok, but that don't stop my muscles from quivering or my stomach from clenching. Fuck I'll be glad when this is over. Brings up too much shit for me, shit I can't push away right now cause I'm tired and hurting, just like Silent Bob said the other day.

Finally, fuck, we're done with current events, the stabbing, the last year I've been living in the street, and I'm steeling myself, getting ready for the crap about how hard I am to place due to my "attitude" and my "history" and all of that shit.

But instead of that, she says, "Jay, there's a few things missing from the file." Chewing on the end of her pen and shuffling through her papers, she looks up at me and narrows those blue eyes. "I don't find many details in here about your last placement. The Carters? Perhaps you can help me with that?"

Mr. Carter. Mr. fucking Carter with his big cock and his hairy arms and his black fucking leather belt with the big buckle that left square welts on the backs of my legs. Mr. Carter who had the run of the house and the three of us foster kids after dark, Mr. Carter who kept me in line by threatening to fuck the other two if I wouldn't let him fuck me.

Dizzy. Fuck. Feel dizzy all of a sudden. Can hardly breathe. My chest hurts.

"Jay?" Silent Bob says on the other side of me, alarmed. Then "Nurse!" I shut my eyes and just concentrate on trying to get air into my lungs. Mr. fucking Carter with his big fucking cock . . . "NURSE!"

Commotion going on now, can hear it even if I can't see it. Mary Sunshine getting shuffled outta the room with her fucking cheap briefcase and her fucking questions about Mr. fucking Carter who got off on making me bleed . . . 

Shit, Jay, you gotta get him out of your fucking head or you're gonna give yourself a goddamn heart attack.

"Jay it's ok." Silent Bob says, rubbing one of my arms while somebody else touches the other. "She's gone now, no more questions, no more anything. Please just try to breathe, ok, and relax. It's over. It's over, ok?" No more, yeah, no more right now, over. No big cocks up my ass here at the hospital, no leather belts.

Then his hand's on my forehead, stroking my hair back. Silent Bob's hand. That's ok. He won't hurt me. He won't let anybody else hurt me either. Beginning to get easier to breathe. Remember now to breathe through my nose, where there's more oxygen, and the hurt in my chest fades.

"That's good, Jay." The doctor. "That's it. Deep breaths through your nose. You're just fine." Then to Silent Bob, "He's ok, Bob. He's ok. Really. Just got overstimulated. Should have known better, I'm sorry about that. Should've known how upsetting this was going to be and made them wait until he was stronger."

Silent Bob keeps stroking my hair and the doctor yaps some more about how my heart just started beating a little faster than they'd like, considering the shape I'm in, but that everything looks fine and there's nothing to be worried about. No harm done.

He finishes up, and I hear him tearing papers from the heart monitor and scribbling in my chart. "Jay, I want you to stay calm. Do you understand?" Open my eyes. Dr. Gardner. He's a nice guy. Always looks kinda tired. He's smiling. "Hello? Do you understand? Stay calm. Behave."

"Yeah." I tell him. Silent Bob sighs and I realize he's been holding his breath. Shit. He was really worried about me. Eyebrows pulled together, lower lip between his teeth. Still has his good hand on my hair. "Sorry." I say, quietly. He sighs again, takes a deep breath and calms down himself as the doctor leaves.

"Don't do that." he says, letting me go and stepping back, rubbing his eyes, cracking his knuckles one handed.

"Do what?"

Shakes his head and smiles. "Freak out like that and scare me." Turns around to his coat hung over the chair, and pats it down for his cigarettes. It ain't his trench, which is still at the cleaners. They're having a hard time washing my blood out of the thing.

"I'll try not to. Bet on it." He laughs, glances out the window. She's still hanging around, that blonde bitch, peering in here at me like I'm a goldfish in a fucking bowl, wringing her hands. Silent Bob watches her a second then turns back to me.

"You ok now? Is it ok if I go have a smoke?" He's gonna talk to her. Give her shit? Make nice? Make time, maybe? She ain't bad looking, for a nervous ninny fucking social worker without a clue. Good size tits. Long as she don't come back in here and remind me of all the stuff I've worked so hard my whole fucking life to forget, I guess it's ok he talks to her.

"Sure. I ain't going nowhere." He touches my arm again before he takes out a cigarette and his lighter and leaves.

Nurse comes over, not that bitch Michelle, who ain't been around since she and Silent Bob had words, but one of the ones who smiles at me and has gentle hands. She fixes my pillow and lowers the bed some, asks me if I'm feeling cold and gets me a heated blanket when I say yes. She fixes it up over me, tucks me in, turns the TV on and gives me the remote.

"Star Wars is coming on Channel 5 in about ten minutes." she whispers, and she runs her hand over my hair like Silent Bob was just doing a few minutes ago before she walks away.

This place ain't so bad, really. Safe. Warm. Some good people, more of them in one fucking place than I've ever seen. And Silent Bob.

Never got around to that part where Julie Campbell had to start talking about what happens when I leave here. I'll tell you one thing, I ain't looking forward to going. I ain't fucking looking forward to it at all. These people ain't had the best track record, now have they? It was them that set me up with Mr. Carter in the first place. 

Shiver. Snuggle down under the warm blanket. Flip over to Channel 5. Forget about it.


	12. Twelve

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

TWELVE

"What are the odds you'd send him home with me?"

Julie Campbell's mouth drops open and she stares at me like I've just grown a third eye.

Twenty minutes we've been out here on the third floor balcony, exchanging pleasantries and information while I try to make my one cigarette last, and I've discovered that Julie, as she's insisted I call her, is not as dumb or as naive as I, and undoubtedly Jay, had assumed. Seven months out of college and six months on the job, she's been sitting in on other people's cases and taking notes until now. Jay's her first real "client", dumped in her lap because no one else wanted him. 

Inexperienced and nervous to be sure. But not dumb.

We've been discussing the difficulty she's going to have in "placing" him when he leaves the hospital. A foster home is one step shy of impossible, given that there's three times as many children in the system as there are willing parents. The likelihood of getting him into a group home, where he'd get counseling and some one-on-one attention if not a surrogate family, isn't much better, considering they've all got waiting lists the length of my arm.

And even if by some miracle she was able to find space for him in one of these places, Jay's a hard sell. I was disheartened but not surprised to hear that he's been tossed out of too many placements to count, for shoplifting, smoking weed, drinking, fighting, skipping school, running away . . . not to mention his "disrespectful" attitude toward authority.

Which leaves a youth center. Two of them in this county, and neither of them any better than juvenile detention. Both seriously overcrowded, with on site dorms and schooling and medical care to ensure no child escapes the premises, understaffed to the point that supervision is limited to making sure the kids don't kill each other with their forks during lunch period.

All of which only confirms the necessity of my asking the question that has Julie's neatly lipsticked mouth gaping right now. She still hasn't answered and my cigarette is now sucked down to nothing. I throw the butt into a sand filled ashtray, wishing I'd brought the pack. Maybe I need to ask her again.

  
"Julie? I realize I must sound nuts, but I still need to know. What are the odds you'd send him home with me?" The half smile and the single arched eyebrow that replace the open mouthed stare are not unkind or contemptuous, but they do suggest we've switched places, with me now playing the role of the simpleton.

"Slim to none." she says. Short and to the point. But the wrong answer altogether. I'll be damned if I've spent ten days watching over Jay's fragile, sleeping form in intensive care only to stand aside with my thumb up my ass while they bus him off to reform school.

"Slim? Ok. I'll bite. What do I have to do?" Julie blinks, shifts her weight from one slightly scuffed grey pump to the other, and crosses her arms.

"Bob, how old are you?"

"Twenty." I say grudgingly, knowing full well it's a strike against me.

"And do you have a job?" I roll my eyes. 

"I'm between jobs right now." Can hardly tell her I've spent the last two years beating up and intimidating junkies and small time drug dealers for a percentage of the debt I can collect. Constructing a more elaborate fib would be a mistake, although I've got the urge to try, because I'm a bad fucking liar.

Julie's brows come together and she shakes her head. _Please drop it, Bob,_ she's telling me. _There's no point in going any further._

"What else?" I press on, swallowing hard against the hopelessness climbing up into my throat at the thought of him walking out of the hospital, weak and thin and shaky, straight into a viper's nest. Can't let it happen. I can't. I won't. "Come on, Julie, what else?"

Reluctantly, she says, "Police record?" Fuck, finally, one with a positive answer.

"Nope. Not so much as a parking ticket." Silence, restraint and self-discipline have so far kept me under the radar of New Jersey's finest. Except . . . 

"Funny, the detective I talked to about Jay's stabbing seems to think it had something to do with pot." Julie says. "Territory dispute, something like that?" 

Fuck her for holding onto that until now. And fuck the cops for caring more about pinning a bag of weed on a boring asshole like me than they do about finding the animal that nearly killed Jay, who still doesn't have the strength to fucking sit up by himself.

Some of that restraint and self-discipline I mentioned would come in handy right now, because I'm about to spew something that could only hurt my chances of getting him out from under the care of these clueless fucks who've sent him to live with at least one pedophile and at least one old lady who whipped him with an electric cord. 

Damn I need another cigarette.

Turn away, take a few deep breaths. The savage anger that's clawing at my stomach begins to subside. Maintain, Bob, maintain. Don't fuck this up. You've got enough cards stacked against you already.

Turn back, hoping my lips are now arranged in some non-threatening pantomime of a smile, hoping my eyes aren't too hard or too cold. Julie doesn't flinch. Ok, good. "If the police had evidence of any sort of crime on my part, don't you think I'd be in jail right now? Instead of standing out here freezing my ass off, talking to you?"

I'll give her credit. She may be scared shitless of Jay, infirm and frail though he is, but she doesn't seem fazed by me in the slightest. "Just because they can't make something stick doesn't mean they're wrong."

"You asked about a record, Julie." I remind her, feeling that rage bubbling up again, and I bite my tongue. "I don't have one. Next question?" Negotiating this minefield is giving me a fucking headache.

Julie sighs and abruptly walks away toward the balcony rail. I follow her until we're both looking out over the dirty one and two story rooftops just below, at the soot, at the flocks of pigeons and the shit they leave behind, at the odd bits of debris that have found their way out of the hospital's windows. Candy wrappers and pop bottles and endless cigarette butts, a plastic trash bag ripped half open and a torn hospital gown. 

The February chill blew through my sweatshirt and jeans a long time ago. Miss my trench coat. Hope they find something to get the stains out. Don't see how I could ever wear it again unless they do, day after day having to look at rust colored splotches of Jay's blood, reminding me of those panicked moments when I thought he might be about to die.

Wish I could say something to Julie about that. Explain how I feel. How empty my life had become before Jay and I crossed paths and how full it's felt ever since. That I understand his "disrespectful" attitude and wouldn't dream of trying to change it. That my acceptance of him is unconditional. That I love him as if he were my own kid and that I'd die or kill to protect him.

If I could explain any of these things, it might make a difference. But I don't speak because it's not in my nature. Instead, I just stand here beside her, staring at the filth that seems to be eating this city from the ground up, and hope that she can see his best chance at survival, physical and otherwise, is with me.

"You've got better odds of winning the lottery than you do of getting custody of him." Julie finally says. "You're too young, you don't have a steady job. And proof or no proof, the police think you're involved with drugs, involvement that may already have resulted in Jay's being stabbed and almost killed. Even if I believed you . . . " She pauses. "It would take alot of work on your part to even try."

She sounds tentative. Open? As if she's thinking about it. Seriously thinking about it.

"Like what?" I encourage her.

"A job, for starters. A _legitimate_ job with a steady paycheck and hours that would have you waiting for him at home when he got out of school."

"Done." I have no fucking idea where to look or what kind of damn job I could get but I don't care.

"You can't do anything about your age. Maybe your parents could vouch for you, write a letter about how responsible and mature you are?" Question stings, unexpectedly, and my eyes are suddenly burning with a few tears. I sniff them back.

"Not likely. They kicked me out when I was sixteen. Been on my own ever since." Clear my throat. "Same apartment, though, same landlord for the last four years. Does that help?" Julie shrugs.

"Can't hurt." 

She turns away from the view then and we sit down on one of the rough concrete benches that dot the balcony. She grips my arm and forces me to look her in the eye. 

"Listen, Bob." she starts off. "This is a real long shot. You need to understand that. You'll have to submit an application to be a foster parent, undergo a background check and a committee interview. It's grueling. It's unlikely they'll approve you, even after all that work. And what if you're successful? You'll have to be there for him. Day and night. No parties, no bullshit. Do you realize what you're getting yourself into?"

"Yeah, I do." I say, without hesitation. "Where the fuck do I sign?" Julie shakes her head, only now she's smiling.

She reaches down and digs through her briefcase, pulls out a handful of paperwork. I grab it. "Be sure you know what you're doing, Bob. Don't raise his hopes. Don't raise his expectations if you think there's any chance you'll back out. He doesn't need anymore disappointments." It's the first time she's expressed anything resembling care for Jay and I wonder if it's been there all along, hidden behind some ethically correct professional facade. I raise my eyebrows and tilt my head in question.

"The file on him is two inches thick." Julie says in answer, digging again through the briefcase, pulling out a battered manila folder stuffed nearly to overflowing with dog eared papers. "I've read this thing cover to cover. I'm deadly serious when I say the last thing he needs is one more adult throwing him away. So if you think there's any possibility you won't be able to follow through on this, I want you to stop now."

Shit. I've underestimated her. Misjudged her. Entirely. Her eyes have the same look mine must take on when I'm watching over him or arguing with someone like that bitch nurse Michelle who made him cry the other day.

Fuck.

"There's not a chance in hell I'm leaving him, regardless of how this application shit works out." I say quietly. Julie nods.

Appointment is set up for her to come back, meet with me about these forms and another dozen she'll have to fill out herself, and then she shakes my good hand and leaves. I roll up the sheaf of papers and go back inside, shivering, cracking my neck.

Jay's sleeping again, as he is so much of the time, head tilted slightly toward the television. All of his golden hair is gathered and laying over one shoulder and his arm is curled around a length of his bed linens, cradling them against his chest like Linus with his security blanket. 

Careful not to make any noise, I slide the chair closer to the bed, stuff the papers into my coat and sit down. Want to take his hand but I know it makes him uncomfortable sometimes, so I don't. I stroke his arm just once instead, reassuring myself that he's warm and safe and still breathing.

I will do anything and everything to make sure he stays that way. Anything and everything.

Whether the government sanctions it or not.

I'd rather have their blessing, of course . . . which is why I'm going to sit down later and labor over these papers. And why I'm going to figure out some way to get myself a straight job, although it's the last thing I ever thought I'd want. There's gotta be something I'm good at besides cracking heads. 

Which reminds me, I'd better give that up, for a while anyway, as long as social services is scrutinizing my activities. Tony's gonna love that. He was pissed enough when he had to come down here to the hospital a couple of days ago to pick up Jay's money and two other collections I'd managed to make on my way home to shower and sleep.

Tony. Light bulb goes off in my skull. Tony has fingers in a few legitimate businesses. Restaurant, pool hall, used car lot. He may not be my best friend, but we go back all four years I've been on my own and I've never stiffed him. He might be able to get me a job.

Shit. I may be able to do this after all. I may just be able to tidy myself up enough to make this work. 

Glance over at Jay again, sleeping peacefully, and wonder for the first time whether he's going like any of this. What he wants is important to me, but I hope to God he doesn't object, because I meant what I said to Julie. I'm not leaving him. 

No matter what.


	13. Thirteen

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

THIRTEEN

So hushed and sedate in here at night. Muted beeps and clicks from the machines in the room are about the only sounds. The nurses whisper, the TV is off, and the lights are dimmed. Ought to be easy to doze off in this environment, that's the point, after all, but for me, it's difficult. Rock hard chair, rock hard muscles. Could go down the hall, to the waiting room, the couches, and sometimes I do. But not tonight.

Tonight I watch Jay, because his sleep is uneasy. And once in a while, I watch the other kids.

It's a pediatric intensive care unit, four beds, all taken. The boy nearest Jay is nine, comatose after a skateboarding accident that's left him brain damaged. On the other side of him is a five year old girl who was mowed down by bullets meant for someone else in a drive by shooting. And the boy against the far wall is twelve, injured by a drunk driver who jumped the curb.

They've all got families. Welfare families, this being a county hospital, gaunt in their threadbare clothes and their grief, but loving families nonetheless who try to spend as much time here as they can. We talk. They're not so much friendly as they are shell shocked, reaching out to somebody who might understand.

A single mom, a wife and husband so young they must have had the five year old when they were in high school, and an elderly couple raising their grandchild. Siblings visit too, aunts, cousins, family friends. There's always someone hovering close, reading a book, knitting, talking, holding hands with those children and stroking their hair.

Jay studies their interactions now and again, brows drawn, breath anxious through the tubes in his nose, jaw clenching. Try to distract him, try to find something on television to draw his attention, try to get him talking about Wolverine or Morris Day or Batman or any other goddamn thing in which he's ever expressed interest.

Never works. Even if I succeed in spurring him to words. Doesn't calm his breathing or dull the pain in his eyes. 

Glance at the clock. Three a.m. If he wasn't moaning occasionally, moving beneath his covers, working one foot against the mattress, I might have gone home to grab eight hours in my own bed. Busy day tomorrow, shopping, starting my hunt for gainful employment. But his restlessness makes me nervous and so I stay.

Shift in the chair, lump of folded papers at my back. Took a trip to the cafeteria after he dozed off for the night, drank coffee, ate mystery meat and wrote until my fingers cramped. These idiots are gonna want to do a body cavity search before they're done, judging by the number and the nature of the questions in these forms. 

Haven't told Jay yet, about my decision. Figure I should wait until I've at least lined up a job, because what if I can't? Whole prospect, such as it is, goes down the toilet then, and just as Julie said, the last thing he needs is one more rug yanked out from under him.

Julie. I shake my head. Blowing in here this afternoon with her well meaning middle class perspective, petrified of upsetting Jay and managing to do quite a job of it anyway. Unlike anyone else I've dealt with in a long time. Unlike anyone else in this room, for that matter.

Look over my shoulder at the children, all sleeping or unconscious. At their families, occupying every chair tonight, in various states of awareness and discomfort.

Jay coughs, eyes fluttering open, and I jerk to attention, reach behind me for the privacy curtain and yank it around. For once it doesn't snag or screech along it's track. Thankful we've got the end berth nearest the hall so it's the only curtain I have to close.

Kid doesn't seem to notice my obvious move, still half asleep and blinking at the ceiling. "Silent Bob?" he whispers uncertainly into the semi-darkness.

"Right here, Jay." Lean forward, slip my arm through the bedrail and take his hand. His fingers twitch and then close around mine. He sighs, relieved.

"Time is it?" Coughs again and his other hand settles against his side.

"Three in the morning."

"What the fuck you doin' here at three in the fucking morning?" he says, turning his head toward me.

I shrug. Been here almost every night, many times in this chair, and he knows that, as much from the nurses commenting on it as from waking sometimes and finding me nearby. 

"Three in the fucking morning." he mumbles, echoing himself. He frowns, moves his fingers from his side to his face, runs them over the scar on his upper lip. Shuts his eyes, winces, swallows. His hand starts to tremble in mine.

"You ok?" He gasps, pushes his head back into the pillow, and covers the side of his face. "Jay, talk to me, what's wrong?" No alarms going off on any of the monitors so I keep my voice down. So far. I scoot closer, squeeze his hand a little tighter.

Seems to help. Jay opens his eyes, stares at me hard, takes long, halting deep breaths. Forcing himself to shake off whatever's pulling at him. Not an easy task, obviously, but eventually the one hand slips down off his face to rest on his chest and the other hand stops shaking. And he blinks.

"Shit." he whispers. Nothing else for a few seconds. Then, "Shrink'd call it a flashback. I seen shrinks, you know, back when I was in school and pissing people off all the time. Make enough noise and they'll try anything to shut you up."

Pull out the most important piece of information buried in all those words. "Flashback?" Jay nods.

"Yeah. Flashback. You know what one is? You ever read anything besides fucking comic books?" Pushing me back. Pushing away the feelings he was battling just a moment ago. Maybe he doesn't want or need to talk about this right now. Maybe he really wants me to retreat.

Then his fingers curl more solidly around mine and his gaze goes back to the ceiling.

"Yeah, I'm familiar with the term." I say carefully. "Post traumatic stress, right? Bad memories surfacing."

Jay snorts. "Maybe you ain't so retarded." Avoiding my eyes, insulting me, keeping an edge in his voice. None of it stings because it's all there to manage the distance between us. Enough that he feels safe but not so much that I'll leave. Quite a delicate balance he's trying to achieve.

Doesn't realize I know the drill. Knowing it brings me even closer. 

"Dream about it sometimes." he goes on eventually. "First time anybody ever put their piece in me. Woke up with my mom's new boyfriend shoving his cock into my mouth. Couldn't fucking breathe. I started fucking swinging at him, trying to get away, and he beat the shit out of me. S'what happened to my mouth." 

Runs his fingers over that scar one more time, sighing. "Twenty eight stitches to sew my lip back together. Got a concussion too, stitches in the back of my head, cause every time he hit me, he slammed my fucking skull into the headboard of my bed. Spent a week in the hospital."

Holy Christ. My stomach lurches but it isn't until I ask him how old he was and he says "Eight." that my throat closes up. Goddamn. Angry and disgusted and sad. Horrified. What the hell must that have been like? How big could he have been at that age?

I think of the nine year old on the other side of the curtain, trying to get an approximation, and have to stifle a sob. So fucking small and defenseless . . . Jay was probably even smaller, as slender and hyperactive as he is. God. Waking up with a cock down his throat, then pummeled probably half to death by a grown man . . . 

"What stopped him?" I choke out. "How'd you get to the hospital?"

"Cops. Neighbors called the cops. Heard me screaming. Heard the headboard whacking the wall." He gives me the information in monotone. Jesus Christ. Screams and thuds loud enough to wake the neighbors. Eight years old.

If this is what's been brewing in his mind the last few hours, it's no wonder he was kicking and groaning and twisting the sheets.

"What are you thinking over there, Silent Bob?" he says, glaring up at the ceiling. "Sitting there feeling sorry for me? Don't. Don't you dare feel fucking sorry for me." 

Pulls his hand loose so I let go, sit back, rub the tears from the corners of my eyes. I feel the distance now, the chill he's emanating, having exposed so much. Maybe more than he meant to. Or maybe it's just that he didn't expect me to care so much and it's obvious I do, no matter that he hasn't looked at me once since he started talking.

Arguing, debating my feelings with him, would be useless. He's through for now. And what would I say, anyway? I _am_ sorry, if sorry means that I can hardly stand to know this ever happened and that I want to just sit here and sob for what he's been through.

God it's hard knowing him. Suddenly feel so tired, so drained. If it's this hard to care about Jay, I can't imagine how hard it is to _be_ Jay. How does he carry around this much pain without buckling beneath the weight of it?

He rolls over a bit, turning that much further away from me. Goes back to sleep after a few minutes, somehow, slight, breathless snores confirming the fact. Reach inside my coat and find the bottle of pills they've prescribed me for my hand and pop a couple of them. I don't indulge during the day, ignoring the constant itching and throbbing, because I don't want to be dopey in case he needs me.

Dopey would be fine just now, though. Dopey would be great. The burning heat of a shot of vodka might be better, but you work with what you have. Settle back, cross my good arm over the one in the sling and close my eyes.

- - -

A few hours of drugged sleep later and I'm good as new. Or as close to that as I can hope to get anytime soon. 

Climb onto the bus one handed and dump change into the slot. Jay was still asleep when I left, recently dosed with medication that's probably going to keep him that way for a while. I told the nurse on duty to be sure he understood I was coming back, and to tell him that the moment he woke up.

Don't want him thinking he chased me off with that memory he shared last night. If anything, I'm more determined to stick around. The need is more obvious than it's ever been.

Wade through the outstretched legs and briefcases and elbows that jut into the aisle and ease into a seat by the window. Damn that feels good, cool cushioned seat under my ass and at my back, after so many hours crammed into that molded plastic chair. I roll my shoulders inside the waist length coat that's been in the back of my closet since I bought the trench, loosen my muscles, crack my neck.

Apartment is a sight for sore eyes, even with the stench of rotting garbage wafting out of the kitchen and a dozen dirty dishes growing mold in the sink. I peel off the coat and the sling, throw my hat on the counter and light up a cigarette.

Yeah, Jay needs me. But not every minute. I've got to take care of myself too, mind my limits.

Dig through the freezer and find a decent TV dinner, throw it in the oven while I take a shower. Hot water fucking burns that left hand but it feels good, scorches out the constant itch. I wash up and then I change the dressing on my hand before I shave and trim my beard and my mustache. Put on something clean and comfortable and watch one of those insipid morning shows while I eat.

Call Tony and set up a meet. Walk to the cleaners and find out they've given up on my trench. Damn. I stare at it, black canvas lined with sheep's wool, durable and warm, too many hidden pockets to count. It's the lining that looks the worst, Jay's blood dark and unavoidable against the wool. Time to retire the old girl.

I bus myself to a shopping center and look through a dizzying array of long coats. There's nothing like what I've lost and for a while, I'm pissed about that until I realize that nothing's ever really going to be the way it used to be, before Jay. Embrace change, Bob. Grow. Become. Don't bother looking back.

A fleck of green catches my eye in a window and I go inside. Dark green trench with black trim, rounded shoulders, a slim collar, and lots and lots of inner pockets. I try it on. Fits just fine and feels good. The price is right. I wear it out of the store.

My next stop is a comic book shop. For once I'm not looking to increase my collection but thinking of Jay. How long has it been since he's had something as frivolous or fascinating as a comic book? Every penny he's managed to score has probably gone for food or shelter or warmth for at least the last year. I pick out about twenty books I think he might like.

What else? What else would keep his eyes off those parents and grandparents? What else might make him smile? I hit an electronics place and buy him a Walkman, along with a few tapes.

Passing a department store, I think of yet something else, something more akin to a need than a want. He'll be up and around soon, out of bed. What few clothes they issue him will be thin and worn and drafty. And he doesn't have any toiletries. Walk out with flannel pajamas, a thick robe, warm slippers, a toothbrush and a hairbrush.

By the time I wander into Sharky's Pool Hall to meet Tony, I'm carrying a big paper shopping bag. He stares, one eyebrow raised. I explained about Jay the last time I saw him, kinda had to, considering the delay in payment and the setting of that meeting, down the hall from intensive care. 

He was not enthusiastic about my involvement with the kid. Even if he has a straight job to offer, he may hesitate because of my reason for wanting it. But he's my best shot. 

This being his place, he goes behind the bar and brings us out a couple of beers. "So what's the story, Bob? You ready to go back to work yet or you still on medical leave?" He eyes my sling as he sits down. I clear my throat and take a swig of my beer.

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about. You know of a straight job I could work for awhile?"

"Straight job?" Tony sits back in his chair. "You can't even make your usual collections cause you're so busy babysitting that snot nosed little – " Clear my throat and give him a hard look. "Sorry." My skills even work on a gangster like Tony. "Alls I'm saying, you don't have time to handle your normal rounds and now you want to take on something extra?"

"No. I'm gonna have to lay low for awhile. You're gonna have to hand off my regulars to somebody else. I need some kind of nine-to-five gig for now, something legitimate." Tony scratches his cheek, thinking, and munches a few peanuts.

"The cops still watching you, probably, because of that mess with the kid . . . " 

Hey, why not? If it makes him more likely to help me out, I'm not going to tell him anything different.

"Well, I suppose I could use you here at Sharky's." he finally says. "Day manager I got in here is a punk, can't find his ass with both hands and a flashlight. Fucks up the inventory, pisses off the lunch crowd, and hides behind the bar if somebody gets rowdy." He quotes me a pretty decent salary, decent for straight work, anyway, and asks when I want to start.

Shit, that was easy . . . "I need a few weeks. Jay's still in intensive care." Tony rolls his eyes but says nothing. "A month, maybe less?" He's agreeable. Again I'm shocked at how easily I've found myself steady employment.

Climb back onto the bus with a smile, a big one. New coat, new job. Gifts for Jay. For some reason, that's the best part. Didn't realize how fun that was going to be, how good it felt to think about his needs and then act accordingly. 

Imagine how that feeling's going to translate to the big picture, to watching his back, putting a roof over his head and food in his stomach, for more than just a few days here and there.

Damn I'm having a good day.


	14. Fourteen

**__**

Disclaimer: Jay & Silent Bob are the intellectual property of Kevin Smith and View Askew Productions, and I have no intent to profit financially from the use of these characters.

FOURTEEN

Fuck. Hate this fucking hospital. 

Yeah, yeah, I know what I said the other day about it being warm and fucking safe and nice here and how piss scared I am about going into another foster home or back into one of those fucking youth centers, specially as weak and fucked up as I'll still be when I leave here. S'all still true.

And I will be out of here soon, out of intensive care at least. Doc came by today and told me I'm doing lots better. Kidneys were the big holdout, they kept having to come in here and run my blood through one of those fucking machines . . . dialysis, I think that's what that shit's called. Anyways, they're finally working. Maybe tomorrow, maybe the next day, they'll ship me outta here and into a room where they don't fucking bother me every ten fucking minutes.

Can't come quick enough, I'll fucking tell you that. Trapped in this fucking bed, people around day and night, never any fucking privacy. You live on the street a while, sleeping and pissing out in the open, eyes on you every fucking minute and always somebody up in your face, you get to craving privacy.

And the noises in here at fucking night, Jesus Christ. People coughing and moving in their chairs, shuffling off to the john, machines beeping and clicking, nurses whispering off in the corner, fucking shit never fucking ends and it makes me crazy. Fucking apeshit, that's what it makes me. Probably wouldn't get no sleep at all if they didn't have me stoned most of the fucking time.

Days ain't much better. Specially when Silent Bob's gone, like he is right now. Gone when I woke up this morning, nurse said he had some errands to do, whatever the fuck those were, and that he'd be back later. I'd say eight fucking hours going by is "later" but there ain't been no sign of that tubby fuck.

No . . . wait . . . staring out the window, the big fucking window right beside me, like I been all day, and I think I see something off down the hall, a round shape in a long coat . . . yeah, oh fuck, it is him, finally. Shit I hate how glad I am to see that fat fuck. Going fucking soft in this goddamn hospital.

He smiles so fucking big when he comes in the door and damned if I can do anything about the big shit eating grin that spreads across my own face.

"Where the fuck you been all day, Lunchbox?" Sit up some in the bed, so fucking excited not to be alone anymore that I'm getting a burst of energy like I ain't felt since I got stabbed. Silent Bob's eyebrows go up, surprised and maybe worried too, seeing me move so sudden. "I'm fine, fuck, man, quit fucking looking at me like that. I asked you a question. Where the fuck you been all day?"

Silent Bob lifts his good hand and I see it's wrapped around the handles of a big paper shopping bag. He rattles it at me. "Went out and spent some mad cash, huh?" He nods, puts the bag down, then flips up the collar of the coat he's wearing and fingers the lapel, just one eyebrow lifted this time, like he's hot shit. 

"Oh a new trench." Does a turn or two, fucking modeling for me, cracks me up. "Yeah, s'nice. Nice coat. Looks good on you. Not real bad ass, like the black one, though, don't know how many punks you can scare in a fucking pussy coat like that, but it's nice." He frowns a second and I laugh. "Nah I'm just kidding. It ain't your coat scared anybody before anyway. Really. Looks good." I stare down at the bag. "What else you get?"

Silent Bob sits down in his usual chair and reaches into the bag, comes out with a handful of comics, sheathed in plastic and protected by backing boards, lays 'em on the bed next to my leg. Pick a couple up while he digs some more in the bag.

"Cool, fucking Wolverine, now that's one bad motherfucker, Silent Bob. You know your fucking superheroes." He plops down another ten books. X-Men, Wolverine, Superman, Batman, Spawn. "Some pretty good shit. Bet you have a pretty big collection somewhere back at your place, huh, bet you were into what . . . maybe fucking Spiderman and Superman, maybe some Green Arrow and Daredevil and shit, back in the day? Am I right?"

No answer so I look up from the comics. He's got his head tipped to one side. 

"What, you silent fuck? What?" Lifts his hand and slides it across the books, like Vanna fucking White, then kinda waves toward me. Books, me. Oh, books . . . mine? These are mine? He's fucking giving these to me? "You're fucking giving these to me? What, like a present?" He nods, and I swear that fucking grin just grew another inch, takes up his whole fucking face.

Shit. Fucking giving me a present. Can't remember the last time somebody gave me a present. Sure, Silent Bob gave me those clothes and that coat but that shit was somewhere between charity and trash collection anyways. This, though. Fucking comics.

Oh fuck. Tears, lump in my throat. I love comics. I do. Ain't had one in years, not to keep. Do you know how hard it is to hold onto shit like that in the street? Im-fucking-possible, that's how hard. Shit there's gotta be twenty fucking comic books here.

Glance at Silent Bob again but he's busy, bent over, and when he comes up he's got something else, a shiny red Walkman and headphones, still in the package, and some tapes. Too stunned to say anything or do anything more than just take 'em cause he's shoving 'em at me and bending over again. Morris Day and the Time, Ice Cube and King Diamond. Fuck. Choice tunes.

And who the fuck woulda put these fuckers together off the top of their head? Nobody. Shit this bitch's been listening to me. Really listening when I run my mouth. Paying attention.

Fucking tears and the fucking lump ain't going away now, for sure.

Puts one more armload of shit on the bed, between my feet. He points at it, makes a face and shrugs, waves off, like he's telling me this stuff's no big deal, and I guess if I was some kid checking out the haul on Christmas morning, maybe I'd agree. Flannel PJ's and a robe and slippers and a toothbrush and a hairbrush.

  
But fuck. Even the kid I used to be woulda been happy to get that shit on Christmas or any other day, fucking shitty as my life's always been. And now? Been wearing the same three shirts and two pairs of pants every fucking day for six months, forget a luxury like pajamas, and how often do you think I got to brush my teeth or my hair living on the street? 

Reach out, touch the flannel, smooth and soft. Clean. Probably gonna feel really fucking good against my skin.

"Fuck, man." I finally say. Can't look at him, not with these fucking tears in my eyes. But I can say it. Won't fucking kill me to say it. "Thank you. Thanks. For all of it."

"You're ok with this, then?" Silent Bob says. Swallow hard and take as deep a breath as I can, and make myself look at him. Silly fuck. Yeah sure, he knows me by now. He was waiting for an ass chewing, wasn't he? But he's still smiling.

"Yeah. I'm ok with it." Face changes then. Concentrating. Thinking. Or something. Shit, what the fuck do I know, spent how many weeks now with this fuck? And I ain't figured out one thing about reading him yet, least when he ain't making faces, so I don't know why the fuck I keep trying.

"Probably should have talked to you about this before." he says. Starting off a new subject, and now I realize he's nervous. "I talked to the social worker yesterday, before she left."

"Oh yeah? What the fuck did she say? She tell you anything about where they're fucking sending me?" Little spark of fear in my stomach now. Probably fucking Parker Youth Center downtown. What it is, it's fucking prison for kids that nobody wants, punishment for having been fucked over every other place in the system. Fucking backwards shit.

Seen the inside of that fucking place more than enough already. First time I was pretty young, didn't know shit, but I fucking learned, living there. Kinda place you don't drop the soap in the fucking showers, you know what I'm saying? Kinda place you sleep with your eyes open and your hand wrapped around a sock full of rocks. Fuck.

Shiver just thinking about it and miss whatever the fuck Silent Bob says next, so busy fucking worrying about Parker.

"Jay, did you hear me?"

"No. What the fuck did you say?"

"We talked about the possibility of you coming to stay with me when you leave the hospital."

Huh. Nah. Musta heard him wrong. No. No. He said "stay with me", he did. Was looking right at him. Still am. Same face I been looking at every fucking day in this hospital. Same guy who sits there and watches me sleep and fucking calms me down when I get scared. Same guy who got sliced trying to protect me.

Wasn't too long ago that I was sitting in his living room floor with my belly full of food, rolling joints and thinking about asking for this exact fucking thing but too proud or too embarrassed or too afraid to do it. And fuck if he ain't offering it to me now.

"Live with you?" I manage to say. Wanna be sure we ain't talking about two different things. "You mean live with you?"

Silent Bob nods, and then he explains how he talked to Mary fucking Sunshine, how she said it was a long shot, how she finally let him fill out the paperwork and how he went out and got himself a real job today. Most words I've ever heard out of his fucking silent mouth all at once since I met him.

Tears come back while he's talking, and my throat tries to close again while something else starts opening up in my gut, somewhere between my heart and my stomach, some kind of feeling I guess, and I don't recognize it. Never been there before. It's warm. It goes along with the tears and the lump and the idea that for once in my fucking life, somebody seems to . . . to fucking care about me? Love me?

Holy fuck, I think I might start bawling for a second, roll over in the bed and cry like a fucking baby just cause it feels so fucking good, but then it intensifies, getting hotter and hotter and stronger and stronger until it fucking twists around on itself and becomes something more familiar.

Some feeling like I used to have when I was a kid, when my folks were fucking sober and not hating it so much, and maybe my mom would smile at me or brush my hair or cook me pancakes for breakfast and I'd think I was in fucking heaven, and I'd start thinking that maybe, just maybe, things weren't always gonna suck, that maybe there was a chance things were gonna change . . . 

Fuck this shit. This is fucking dangerous, this feeling, it's fucking trust and it's hope and it's need, and every fucking one of those is something they can use against you, hurt you worse than a knife or a fist or a fucking cock up your ass ever could.

"Fuck this shit." I whisper and I gotta look away from him because I know I'm so opened up, so raw and so fucking needy right now, that he could put a hook right into me and drag me someplace I don't wanna fucking go . . . 

"What?" Silent Bob asks me. "What did you say?"

"Said fuck this shit." Don't have the balls to do more than whisper it one more time. All that fucking energy and all that good shit, all those good feelings, just gone. Just rolling outta me. Oh God. Slip down under the covers and if I could, I'd throw my leg to the side and kick those fucking comic books off the bed, those books and tapes and fucking pajamas and all of it, just kick every bit of it into the floor, but I'm so fucking wrecked I can't even do that.

Can't even say nothing else.

Silent Bob's bending over me now and I can feel his hand on my shoulder, this way he has of putting it there and not moving and just waiting, and there's something inside of me that won't let me push him away. I want to. I want to just fucking hit him in his fat fucking face and scream at him to get the fuck away and never come back but I can't.

I can't. 

Crying now, swear to fucking God it never ends with the fucking crying in this goddamn hospital, s'just one thing after another and I'd blame it on the dope and the injuries if I could but I know that ain't what makes me lay here sobbing into my pillow. It's the old wounds that hurt me the most, the ones that never left a fucking mark or a scar anywhere but my heart.

He knows that. Silent tubby fuck standing over me and just gently touching my shoulder and waiting, he knows that. Guy who'd risk his own life to save mine, guy who'd go out and buy all this shit and give it to me knowing it's probably gonna end up with me ripping him a new asshole, guy who'd offer me a place to live and expect nothing in return. 

I fucking know who he is, even the way I feel right now, I know.

So crazy, so fucking mixed up, having both things in my head at once, the suspicion and the rage and the fucking despair that comes from fourteen goddamn years of being fucked and beat and thrown away like a piece of fucking trash, and this new soft feeling, still kicking around underneath the pain, brought on by knowing that this stupid fucker really does care about me and he really don't have any hidden agenda.

Don't make no fucking sense at all.


End file.
